Belgian minister of Finance, Van Peteghem, proposed 23 action points as part of a second action plan to continue the fight against social and fiscal fraud.
The first action plan focused on cooperation between the tax authorities and the public prosecutor in the combat against fraud. We refer to our previous newsflashes regarding legislative proposals (newsflash of 25 March 2022) and legislative measures adopted (newsflash of 4 April 2022) in the field of tax procedure.
The press release on the second action plan mentions following main suggested action points:
A prolonged investigation and assessment period of ten years is proposed for complex files.
Even though the details are unclear and not yet put into legislation, the direction of travel is clear and we strongly advise businesses to review their data retention policies.
Furthermore, according to the press release, the UBO-register, i.e. the database where all the "Ultimate Beneficial Owners" or "ultimate beneficiaries" of a company or other legal entity are registered, will increase in importance and will be subject to cross-referencing and data mining in view of detecting phantom companies especially in the construction industry.
The action plan also has the intention to gain a better understanding of the financial and fiscal situation of foreigners in Belgium. The information shared on the basis of the Common Reporting Standards (CRS) could therefore be of use for Belgian tax purposes.
Finally, obstruction of a tax investigation will be punishable by a judge with penalty payments (dwangsom/astreinte).It may be carefull for businesses to revise their policies in order to avoid Physically or digitally hindering access by the tax authorities to buildings or servers, in the framework of a fraud investigation.
We will of course closely monitor how these action points will be translated into concrete legislative proposals.
