Renewed audit and assessment deadlines for income taxes
January 2024 - The Miscellaneous Tax and Financial Provisions Act of 20 November 2022 extends the audit and assessment deadlines for income taxes in certain situations that the tax administration must take into account.
The applicable three-year period for checking a timely filed and formally correct return remains unchanged.
As from assessment year 2023, this period will be four years in case of a non-filed or late declaration. In this case, you should also take into account additional risks, such as the possibility of an ex officio assessment, a fine for non-filing or a tax increase.
The law introduces a new deadline of six years for "semi-complex declarations" with "international aspects". These include declarations of a Belgian group entity subject to transfer pricing reporting, declarations that must report payments to tax havens (form 275F) and declarations with a credit for the flat-rate portion of foreign tax ("FBB").
A new deadline of 10 years will now apply to so-called "complex returns". Complex returns are:
a personal income tax return that must mention a "legal arrangement in another State"
the presence of a so-called "hybrid mismatch"
undistributed profits arising from a foreign CFC set up primarily to obtain tax benefits (a so-called "artificial construction", within the meaning of art 185/2 CIR92)
In case of fraud, a special period of 10 years instead of seven years will apply from now on.
The new law also provides that the tax administration can impose a penalty through the courts on taxpayers who refuse to cooperate with audits.
