Tax

-Our Services-

Our tax advisory services are structured along the following lines of expertise:

Value Added Tax – domestic law and EU directives, Customs, Excise duties
Corporate income tax (permanent establishments, financing and interest deductibility rules, capital gains)
Withholding tax (domestic law vs. double tax treaties)
Individual taxation and social security matters, stock option plans
Investment incentives and profit repatriation
Local taxes (e.g. building tax, land tax, vehicle tax)
Dividend taxation
EU directives

Tax Compliance

We provide our clients with a full range of Romanian tax compliance services, aimed at relieving companies from the burden of time-consuming and possible costly processes such as data gathering, drafting tax returns, acknowledging the tax risks associated with the specificity of their business, identifying potential tax planning opportunities, dealing with the tax authorities. Our compliance services allow you to spare time and release resources necessary for further development of your business activities.

VAT compliance services

Drafting, issuing, archiving, reviewing invoices
Preparation, submission, signing or review of tax returns and periodical reporting and statements
Preparation and maintenance of VAT books
Filing VAT reclaims and assist during VAT audits
Payment instructions or managing payments

Corporate income tax compliance services

Reviewing invoices and accounting documents and data used to compute the tax due
Review transactions under domestic legislation vs. Double Tax Treaties
Corporate income tax/capital gains tax compliance – preparation and filing of quarterly statements and annual corporate income tax returns, submission of tax residency certificates for non-resident clients, liaison with brokers
Tax reclaims for refund of any overpaid capital gains tax
Payment instructions, liaison with the client’s bank as well as with the Romanian tax authorities
Representation in front of the Romanian tax authorities

Tax Representation for VAT Purposes

Our tax representation services include, but are not limited to:

General and specific assistance on VAT, depending on the operations carried out
Assistance during the process of registration for VAT purposes in Romania, and during the process of deregistration at the end of the relevant activity
Declaration formalities, VAT payment, keeping the records required by law in respect of VAT in Romania
Intrastat declaration formalities
Assistance during the process of claiming VAT refunds
VAT-related audits, sanity checks and tax planning
Correspondence with tax authorities

Tax Proxy for Corporate Income Tax and Capital Gains Purposes

Our services include, but are not limited to:

Assistance during tax registration in Romania and during deregistration
Tax formalities such as filing tax returns and tax residency certificates
Providing tax payment instructions and assistance in paying taxes to the State budget
Assistance with any possible applications for refund of overpaid taxes
Ensuring the relationship with brokers and other intermediaries in transactions
Correspondence with the Romanian tax authorities

Representation for Claw-Back Tax Purposes

Our services include, but are not limited to:

Advice on laws related to the claw-back tax and on legislative updates on reporting in the field
Notification of the Health Agency concerning representation for claw-back tax payment
Declaration formalities, requesting and sending records required by law regarding the claw-back tax in Romania
Providing instructions for payment of the quarterly contribution, and assistance in paying it to the State budget
Correspondence with relevant authorities, assistance in formulating notices, appeals

Tax Representation for Investment Funds

Tax Representation can assist with a range of services related to tax representation of non-resident investment funds for transactions involving securities in Romania: registration / deregistration, tax compliance, correspondence with tax authorities, specific planning and advice.

Refunds of VAT, Withholding Tax, Tax on Dividends and Capital Gains Tax

Our services dedicated to the refund of taxes paid in Romania target resident or non-resident clients that are interested in obtaining refunds such as:

VAT refund for non-resident companies
VAT refund for companies registered for VAT purposes
Refund of withholding tax, tax on dividends and capital gains tax

Tax Representation Consulting and Planning

In addition to specific services, tax representation and empowerment services include consulting on optimization of payment liabilities, and assistance and/or representation before tax authorities by means of explanatory reports or meetings.

Tax Controversy

We assist clients in dealing with any deficiency in tax assessments made by the Romanian tax authorities or mitigate the possibilities of adverse assessments by the authorities for clients in the process of a tax audit. Our services are based on the extensive expertise gained by our team in dealing with the Romanian tax authorities in such matters, as well as on our long-term relationship with the Romanian tax authorities.

Our tax audit support services include inter-alia:

Analysis and factual investigation of the tax areas concerned
Independent assessment of the tax status of our clients prior to investigation, in order to identify in advance any areas of potential risk
Prepare and formulate our client’s position on the debated tax issues, by bringing legal arguments to defend the approach of our clients
Manage the tax audit process and focus on the most cost-effective way to achieve the closure of the tax investigation carried out by the Romanian tax authorities, thus leaving the client’s personnel to concentrate on carrying on the normal business activities
Represent our clients in front of the Romanian tax authorities during the tax audit and during the final discussions with the Romanian tax inspectors in order to present the technical arguments and argue the client’s position clearly and persuasively
Assess the strengths and the weaknesses of our client’s approach to certain tax issues, with a view to evaluate the chances of succeeding in the event of a court trial with the Romanian tax authorities
Assist further in the litigation process, should the client decide to proceed on this course of action

Tax litigation support

We support our clients in tax disputes with the Romanian tax authorities via our litigation support line of services. Based on the extensive experience gained by our team, we have successfully assisted a large number of clients on a wide range of taxation litigation areas, by drafting appeals against decisions of the Romanian tax authorities and Romanian courts of all levels and assisting our clients along the litigation process.

Our tax litigation support services include inter-alia:

Practical training sessions, aimed at helping clients deal with the day-to-day tax issues affecting their business
Tax seminars on specialized taxation or industry-related topics, such as:
Analysis, factual investigation, and preparation of the grounds for appeal
Providing the client with a completely independent assessment of the tax matters under debate
Preparing and formulating the client’s position
Preparing written appeals
Providing seamless representation together with the client’s lawyers / litigators.

Transfer pricing documentation

If you carry out transactions with related parties, you should know that you have the formal obligation to prepare a transfer pricing documentation file and present it to the tax authorities.

Our services include:

Planning and prioritizing the inter-company transactions to be documented based on a risk Assessment analysis, resource availability and your budget
Review of the transfer pricing documentation prepared internally by your team, which needs updates or which is prepared at the group level but needs compliance with local requirements
Development of benchmarking studies to support the transfer prices charged
Advice on the most appropriate transfer pricing methodology for a given transaction
Assistance with the functional interviews and financial analysis

Benchmarking studies

The purpose of a benchmarking study is to identify comparable transactions that are further used to assess whether the inter-company transactions under review comply with the arm’s length principle.
Performing a benchmarking study to test the arm’s length nature of an inter-company transaction is a complex process that requires examination of various databases and sources of information such as Amadeus, Royalty Stat, Loan Connector, Bloomberg.
We can either perform these benchmarking studies as part of the transfer pricing documentation file or as part of your planning exercise.

Advance Pricing Arrangements applications and assistance

As transfer pricing is a complex subject with a lot of room for interpretation, more and more multinationals look for upfront agreement with the tax authorities on the pricing policy they would like to apply. This can be done through an Advance Pricing Agreement (APA).
An APA is a contract, usually for 5 years, entered by a taxpayer and one or more tax authorities specifying the pricing method that the taxpayer will apply to its related-company transactions.
The APAs are extensively used as a risk avoidance strategy as they help taxpayers voluntarily resolve actual or potential transfer pricing disputes in a proactive, cooperative manner with the tax authorities.
Assistance with APA requests is one of our core services. If you are interested to apply for an APA, we can guide you through the whole process. This includes arranging for a preliminary meeting with the tax authorities, drafting the APA application and assisting you during the negotiations with the tax authorities so that you obtain a favorable outcome.