The President of Ukraine signed the Law of Ukraine “On Education” of September 5, 2017, No. 2145-VIII, which introduces significant changes in the life of educational institutions, educators, schoolchildren, students. This is reported on the official website of the Head of State.
According to the new law, educational institutions will be obliged to publish on their sites estimates and financial reports on the receipt and use of all funds received. This, among other things, will allow parents to monitor on what needs the school spends provided money.
The school period will last for 12 years. Generally, it will be a three-level school: primary, basic and profession-oriented secondary education. And the latter will have appropriate orientations that will enable senior students to choose the direction of learning according to their skills, rather than learning everything and anything.
The Law on Education establishes a number of guarantees for raising wages, as well as various allowances and surcharges for educators.
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine by its Resolution “On Amendments to the Rules for the Provision and Receipt of Telecommunication Services” of 20.09.17, No. 703 amended the Rules for the Provision and Receipt of Telecommunication Services. Thus, the order of sending charity SMS was regulated at the normative level. Fundraising for charity by means of sms messages is carried out according to the agreement of joining between the operator and the corresponding organization with the indication of the telephone number allocated for collecting funds.
The operator must inform the subscribers in advance about the name of the charity service and the amount of money that he/she will transfer from their personal account for charity. After sending a charity sms, the operator must inform the subscriber of the amount of money that has been withdrawn from his/her account.
The operator must provide services for sending SMS-donations in favour of non-profit organizations (except political parties) free of charge.
The State Fiscal Service of Ukraine in its Individual Tax Advice “On appeal to the court on the application of penalties and the payment of a penalty for non-payment (non-transfer) or untimely payment (untimely transfer) of the unified contribution” of 15.09.17, No. 1969/6/99-99-13-02-01-15/ІПК reported the following. As it is known, after receiving a decision on the application of a fine and a penalty for the untimely payment of the unified social contribution (hereinafter − USC), the insured has 10 calendar days for their payment. In case of disagreement with such decision, the policyholder has the right to appeal against it, in particular, in court. In addition, the appeal will stop the above payment deadline. Payers should know that the relevant fiscal authority must necessarily be notified in writing about the appeal. This is provided for by para. 2 of sec. 14 of Art. 25 of the Law of Ukraine “On the Collection and Accounting of the Unified Contribution to the Mandatory State Social Insurance” of 08.07.10, No. 2464-IV. If not informed, after the expiration of the 10-day term, the fiscal authority will pass the decision to the executive service.
The State Fiscal Service of Ukraine in its Individual Tax Advice “On the exemption from VAT of services for the carriage of passengers on public bus routes” of 14.09.17, No. 1958/6/99-99-15-03-02-15/ІПК has explained to carriers, which are the payers of value added tax (hereinafter - VAT), the peculiarities of application of the benefit from para. 197.1.8 of the Tax Code of Ukraine (hereinafter - TCU). Representatives of the fiscal department in advice considered services for passenger transportation on public bus routes.
Such services without charging a 20 percent tax can be provided under the condition that the transportation is carried out within the settlement and tariffs for such transportation are established by the authorized state authority or local self-government. Otherwise, transportation should be the subject to VAT according to the general rules.
Also, tax officials emphasized that the carrier is not entitled to refuse to use the privilege under discussion or to stop its use for one or several tax periods. After all, the release is not provided directly to the taxpayer, but provided for a specific transaction delivery.
The State Fiscal Service of Ukraine in its Individual Tax Advice “On adjusting the financial result before taxation on the amount of accrued depreciation of the leased integral property complex and its repairs (improvements)” of 15.09.17, No. 1976/6/99-99-15-02-02-15/ІПК clarified that a company that leased an integral property complex (state or communal property) should adjust the accounting financial result to depreciation differences. That is:
- increase the financial result before tax on the amount of accrued accounting depreciation of production fixed assets included in the leased integral property complex;
- reduce the financial result before tax on the amount of estimated tax depreciation of such fixed assets.
The obligation to apply such differences will arise only in the situation where the taxpayer will have an annual income tax of more than UAH 20 million or will decide on an adjustment on his/her own.
Such a conclusion is based on para. 3 of Art. 23 of the Law of Ukraine ‘On the lease of state and communal property” of 10.04.92, No. 2269-XII. It says that depreciation deductions for leased integral property complexes of enterprises, their structural divisions, buildings and structures are levied and left by the tenant.
Representatives of the fiscal department also emphasize that in case of repair of the leased integral property complex, the VAT payer will have the right t to a tax credit for such expenses. This requires:
- an integral property complex to be used in the economic activity of the company;
- the tax invoices prepared by the supplier for such transactions to be registered in the Unified Register of Tax Invoices.
The Ministry of Finance of Ukraine by its Order “On Approval of the Procedure for Providing Information from the Register of Insurers of the State Register of Mandatory State Social Insurance” of 21.07.17, No. 651 approved the Procedure for providing information from the register of insurers of the State Register of Mandatory State Social Insurance.
Consequently, if the unified contribution payer or insured person will need documentary evidence of the insurer, they will be able to obtain an extract from the insurer’s register in accordance with the approved procedure.
The order defines the forms of:
- a request for obtaining an extract from the register of insured persons (form No. 1-ЗРС);
- extracts from the register of insured persons (form No. 1-ВРС − for legal entities-insurers, form No. 2- ВРС and No. 3-ВРС − for individuals-insured persons);
- certificates of absence of information in the register of insured persons (form No. 1-ДРС).
The extract or certificate should be provided to the unified contribution payer or the insured person upon their request in electronic or paper form free of charge within two working days following the day of receipt of such request.
The Ministry of Regional Development, Construction and Housing and Communal Services of Ukraine by its order “Some Issues of the Expertise of Project Design Documents for the Construction of Objects” of 15.08.17, No. 204 defined the criteria that should be met by expert organizations of any ownership form that carry out the examination of construction projects.
In addition to general criteria there are also put forward strengthened requirements to expert organizations, if they want to carry out an examination of projects for the construction of objects that are classified as medium-impact (CC2) or with significant consequences (CC3) or objects constructed in territories with complicated engineering-geological and technogenic conditions or in relation to the estimated part of the project documentation of facilities constructed at the expense of state funds if their estimated cost exceeds UAH 300 thousand.
The National Securities and Stock Market Commission (hereinafter − NSSMC), by its decision “On Amendments to the Regulation on the Procedure for Reporting by Depositary Institutions to the National Commission on Securities and Stock Market” of 10.08.17, No. 584 amended the Provision on the reporting procedure by the depositary institutions to the National Securities and Stock Market Commission, approved by the decision of the NSSMC from 11.06.13, No. 992.
Now, additionally it will be necessary to disclose information about the holders of the shares of the PJSC, which have rights for shares in the amount of 5% or more of the authorized capital. Now, if the issuer is a public joint stock company, the owner of the block of shares is considered to be the person who has the rights to shares in the amount of 5% (and not the minimum 10% as before) and more than his/her authorized capital.
In fact, these changes are due to the update of 23.03.17 of certain provisions of the Law of Ukraine “On Securities and the Stock Market” dated 23.02.06, No. 3480-IV (paragraph 15 of the Law of Ukraine “On Amendments to Certain Legislative acts of Ukraine on increasing the level of corporate governance in joint-stock companies” dated 23.03.17, No. 1983-VIIІ). That is, at present the subjects to the disclosure in the stock market are:
- information on holders of packages (10% or more) of shares of private joint stock companies (regardless of type and/or class). It is submitted to the Securities Depositary by the Central Securities Depository within the statutory time limits;
- information on holders of shares of public joint stock companies, the package of which is 5% or more shares. It is submitted by the Central Depository to the issuer of securities in the period established by the NSSMC. In particular, this information must contain:
a) the size of the package of such owner, indicating the percentage, quantity, type and/or class belonging to such shareholder;
b) information about the owner indicating the name of the owner, the code according to the USR (for the legal entity − resident), or the code / number from the commercial, bank or judicial register, registration certificate of the local authority of the foreign state on the registration of the legal entity (for the legal entity − non-resident).
At the same time, information about the holders of 10% or more shares of private joint-stock companies and holders of shares of public joint stock companies, which package is 5% or more, is open and disclosed in the order established by the NSSMC by placing of valuable securities of the NSSMC in the publicly accessible information database on the market.
The Supreme Administrative Court of Ukraine in its ruling of 06.09.17 in the case No. K/800/5707/17 came to the conclusion that the debtor, who received an additional benefit in the form of forgiveness (cancellation) of the principal amount of the debt on the loan and which was duly informed about forgiveness of such a debt, must reflect the canceled amount of debt in the taxable income and transfer the income tax to the budget.
The reason for such a conclusion is sub-para. “д” of para. 164.2.17 of TCU, according to which the amount of debt, forgiven (canceled) by the creditor on his/her own decision, not related to the bankruptcy procedure, before the expiration of the limitation period, are included in the income of the debtor, if it exceeds 25% of one minimum wage (calculated per year), established on January 1 of the reporting tax year.
In addition, the creditor (that is, the bank), which forgave the debt, should include the amount of the canceled debt to the tax calculation for f. № 1ДФ on the basis of the reporting period, in which such a debt was forgiven.
Consequently, even if the bank forgives the part of the debt to the lender, as it happened in the considered situation, the amount of the canceled debt is for the debtor an additional benefit with all the consequences. The debtor independently pays a tax on such income and reflects them in the annual tax return.
