The State Secretary for Finance has classified objections to the tax interest on corporation tax assessments as a mass objection.
REMEMBER
That does not mean that taxpayers can stop lodging pro forma objections to those tax assessments. Only taxpayers who have lodged an objection in good time will benefit in due course, should the Supreme Court rule in their favour in the current proceedings. Anyone who has not lodged an objection, or has not done so in time, will miss out.
A timely objection means that the notice of objection has been lodged within 6 weeks of the date of the final tax assessment.
If the tax interest has been calculated on the basis of a provisional assessment, it is not possible to lodge an objection under the law. In that case, a request for an ex officio reduction must be made. Such a request must be made no later than 6 weeks after the date of the final assessment. The Tax and Customs Administration will reject the request for a reduction of the provisional assessment. An objection may then be lodged against this rejection, to be submitted within 6 weeks of the date of the decision rejecting the request.
It is relatively common for (virtually) no tax interest to have been calculated on a final corporation tax assessment, but for the interest to have been charged on the provisional assessment(s) instead.
Massive objection
The phenomenon of mass appeals exists primarily for the convenience of the government. Should the Supreme Court rule in its favour, the government can then settle all the appeals lodged with a single ruling.
By classifying the objections as a mass objection, it is clear that the Tax and Customs Administration will set these objections aside until the Supreme Court has reached a decision. This does not apply to requests for an ex officio reduction of provisional assessments.
The mass objection procedure applies exclusively to objections relating to the rate of tax interest, in which a request is made to reduce the tax interest to 4%. Objections that are based (in part) on other grounds will be dealt with individually (which, in practice, will mean that they are rejected). The mass objection procedure applies only to:
- tax interest on corporation tax (with effect from 1 October 2020);
- tax interest on the solidarity contribution (with effect from 1 January 2022);
- tax interest on the minimum tax (with effect from 1 January 2024);
- tax interest on the profit share (with effect from 1 January 2025).
Tax interest on income tax assessments and income-related contributions under the Health Insurance Act has not been subject to the mass objection procedure.