Spanish General Tax Act Reformed

On 12 October the amendments to the Spanish General Tax Act entered into force. These improvements will contribute to the transparency of the legislation and the efficiency in the fight against fraud, the publication of the list of tax debtors being one of the measures.

The General Tax Act dates from 2003 (Law 58/2003) and has been previously amended several times (mainly in 2006 and 2012) in order to adapt it to the changing tax environment. The fight against fraud is reinforced by strenghtening the investigation powers of tax auditors and establishing a new penalty in case of abuse of law for agressive tax planning purposes. Legal certainty has been improved with clear deadlines for finalizing tax auditing procedures (18 months as a rule, with some exceptions). This will also aim to reduce litigation on procedural aspects.

Last but not least, the Spanish Tax Agency will publish on an annual basis a list of tax debtors with pending debts or fines over one million €. The first list will be released at the end of year 2015 calculated with data as of 31 July 2015.