Handling of taxpayers’ complaints under the procedures of administrative appeal of tax notice-decisions by the State Fiscal Service can now be open, transparent and conducted with the mass media participation.
The loudest precedent that attracted authorities’ attention to this problem was hearing of the Savik Shuster Studio TV Production Company case on January 19 and March 30, 2016. Read more
In order to ensure transparency of the State Fiscal Service decisions, International Legal Center EUCON prepared and initiated changes to the Procedure of Taxpayers’ Complaints Handling (Ministry of Finance Order № 916 as of October 21, 2015), which were later approved by Ministry of Finance Order №849 of 28.09.2016 and entered into force on 25.11.2016.
Positive changes of the new edition are:
- technical recording of the proceeding by means of photography, video and audio;
- consideration of case materials involving the mass media, Business Ombudsman Council in Ukraine, authorized representatives of the central executive body that forms and implements the state financial policies, authorized representatives of the central executive body that implements the state regulatory policy;
- possibility to get acquainted with the materials of the complaint recorded by technical means and use the assistance of an attorney;
- possibility to submit petitions concerning the subject of the complaint;
- possibility to oblige participation in the complaints consideration of persons who carried out the inspection or made decisions, and oblige them to provide explanations;
- integrated tax advice must be taken into account when considering the complaints by taxpayers during the administrative appeal;
- proposals by the central executive body representative that forms and implements the state financial policies, proposals by the central executive body representative that implements the state regulatory policy, proposals by the Business Ombudsman Council representative or reasoning if such proposals were rejected by the State Fiscal Service authority, must be specified.
Subject to those changes, the Procedure of Taxpayers’ Complaints Handling has become more transparent and public, while the rights of taxpayers are now more clear and extended, allowing taxpayers to use additional procedural possibilities to defend their interests against unlawful decisions by the State Fiscal Service.
Reminder:
On January 19, 2016 International Legal Center EUCON together with Savik Shuster Studio journalists, “Business” and “Yurydychna Praktyka” newspapers, people’s deputies Andrii Zhurzhii and Dmytro Dobrodomov managed to create a precedent of taxpayer’s administrative complaint public hearing by the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine. The video from Shuster LIVE:
On March 30, 2016 a reconsideration of the administrative complaints by “Savik Shuster Studio” LLC on tax notices-decisions handed down in 2015 took place in the Central Department of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine.
Lawyers of the International Legal Center EUCON, who represent the interests of the complainant, announced the offences committed by the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine officials of different levels which resulted in forming of irregular legal position and called into question the legality of the inspection as a whole.
However, on April 13, 2016 the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine informed Savik Shuster Studio of rejection of the appeal on tax notices-decisions handed down in 2015.
The video from Shuster LIVE:
LATEST NEWS ON THE SAVIK SHUSTER STUDIO CASE
