At the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the state offered tax benefits for businesses. According to the amendments to the Tax Code introduced in the spring of 2022, taxpayers from March 1 to December 31, 2022 were given the opportunity to be temporarily exempted from the accrual and payment of taxes for land plots and real estate located in the territories where hostilities are (were) taking place. In April 2023, the law implied that the state should not fine a business for non-payment of such taxes, and all debts specified in tax notifications-decisions are subject to cancellation.
Nevertheless, during 2023, the Business Ombudsman Council received several complaints from Kyiv enterprises, which were charged fines by the tax authority, despite the fact that they used benefits during the given period. The property of the complainants is located in the city of Kyiv, and the capital was included in the list of territories of active hostilities from 24.02.2022 to 30.04.2022. However, in each case, tax officials detected an understatement of land tax or real estate tax. As a result, the fines ranged from 500k to 1 mn hryvnias.
The Council has raised the issue of applying land and real estate tax benefits at the Expert Group with the State Tax Service of Ukraine (STS of Ukraine) several times. In addition, for each complaint, BOC addressed a letter to the STS of Ukraine and asked to withdraw the tax notifications-decisions, because the companies did not violate the law. Separately, the STS of Ukraine considered administrative complaints of enterprises with the Council’s participation.
In the end, thanks to the BOC mediation, the tax authority canceled the relevant real estate tax accruals and fines.
