{"id":1640,"date":"2025-09-05T07:40:14","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T05:40:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/uncategorized\/advieskosten-ook-een-verkapte-dividenduitkering\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T10:34:59","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T09:34:59","slug":"consultancy-fees-are-also-a-disguised-dividend-payment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/advieskosten-ook-een-verkapte-dividenduitkering\/","title":{"rendered":"Advisory fees also a (disguised) dividend payment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our article <a href=\"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/nieuws\/vat-on-consultancy-costs-also-not-deductible\/\">VAT on consultancy fees<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/nieuws\/vat-on-consultancy-costs-also-not-deductible\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">s<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/nieuws\/vat-on-consultancy-costs-also-not-deductible\/\">nor are they deductible<\/a> Earlier this week, we ended with the question of whether the trilogy would be completed. That has now been confirmed. The <a href=\"https:\/\/deeplink.rechtspraak.nl\/uitspraak?id=ECLI:NL:RBZWB:2025:5699\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Zeeland-West Brabant District Court<\/a> has ruled that the expenses paid by the private limited company for advice on business succession, which do not qualify as deductible costs for the purposes of corporation tax (see our article <a href=\"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/nieuws\/consultancy-costs-not-deductible\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Consultancy fees are not tax-deductible<\/a>) and on which VAT is not deductible are treated, for income tax purposes, as a (disguised) dividend payment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Dual awareness<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The criteria to be applied when determining whether a (disguised) dividend payment has taken place are slightly different from those applied in relation to the deductibility of expenses for corporation tax purposes and in relation to the deductibility of VAT:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>there must be a transfer of assets from the private limited company to the shareholder, as a result of which a sum of money or value is withdrawn from the company\u2019s assets;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>the withdrawal must be covered by profits held within the private limited company;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>and both the private limited company and the shareholder must have been aware of the transfer of assets (dual awareness).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The first two criteria are not in dispute in these proceedings. The shareholder maintains that he was not aware of the transfer of assets. In this regard, he argues that he sought detailed advice from tax advisers, who were of the opinion that the consultancy fees constituted business expenses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Court considers that the shareholder, who was also a director of the private limited company, must reasonably have been aware that, by charging private expenses to the company\u2019s profits, he was benefiting in his capacity as a shareholder. The tax adviser, too, should reasonably have been aware of this, and the Court attributes the adviser\u2019s knowledge to the shareholder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Court concludes that the Tax and Customs Administration was correct to levy income tax on the consultancy fees that had been wrongly charged to the private limited company\u2019s profits (substantial interest tax; Box 2).<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ons artikel BTW op advieskosten ook niet aftrekbaar sloten we eerder deze week af met de vraag of de trilogie zou worden voltooid. Inmiddels is dat het geval. De Rechtbank Zeeland-West-Brabant heeft geoordeeld dat de door de BV betaalde uitgaven voor adviezen over de bedrijfsopvolging, die in het kader van de vennootschapsbelasting niet als aftrekbare [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vwg.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}