Accountant mistakenly paid income tax to the wrong account. The payment was sent to another budget account. What should the enterprise expect in such a case?
Penalties
It's good if the mistake is discovered in a timely manner and before the end of the deadline for tax liabilities payment your payment is made to the account with the correct details. In this case, there will be no penalties and fines. You just have to wait until the payment made to the wrong account is refunded.
But if the deadline for paying tax liabilities has already passed, then the penalties can not be avoided. In addition, they are charged automatically in the integrated payer card (hereinafter – IPC). Tax officials only state this fact in the tax notification-decision.
The position of the tax officials on this issue is clear. They believe that if the taxpayer has incorrectly filled in the details of the payment documents or payed funds to the wrong budget classification code, the funds will not be credited to the appropriate budget classification account, and therefore the taxpayer's monetary obligation will not be paid. Therefore, such a taxpayer bears the responsibility established by the current law (category 132.01 “ZIR”).
Thus, according to item 126.1 of the Tax Code of Ukraine (hereinafter – TCU) for violation of rules for payment (transfer) of taxes, the payer is held liable in the form of a penalty of 10 or 20% of the paid amount of the tax debt.
The amount of the penalty depends on the number of days of delayed payment of the monetary obligation following the last day of the payment term and is:
- 10% – in case of delay of payment up to 30 calendar days inclusive;
- 20% – in case of delay of payment for more than 30 calendar days.
In case of violation of the term of payment of excise tax, a fine of 20% of the amount of the monetary obligation will be applied regardless of the number of days of delay (item 126.2 of the TCU).
Fine
In addition, Art. 129 of the TCU provides for a fine for each day of delay.
And Article 89 of the Criminal Procedure Code enables taxpayers to pay off a payer's debt at the expense of his/her property.
Administrative responsibility
Also keep in mind the administrative responsibility set by Art. 1632 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses. Failure to submit or late submission of the payment order for the transfer of taxes and fees (compulsory payments) by the officials of the enterprise due inflicts a fine for the officials in the amount of:
- 5 to 10 tax-free minimum incomes (hereinafter – TFMI) (UAH 85–170);
- 10 to 15 TFMI (UAH 170–255) – in case of repeated violations during the year.
Minor mistake inflicts serious consequences
As you can see, such a small, at first glance, mistake can lead to serious consequences. And this is given that the payer did not actually breach the tax payment deadline. This should be highlighted in the letter for the recalculation of funds wrongly paid. It should be emphasized that the funds paid to the erroneous account were received in the budget on time, without violating the deadline for paying taxes. If that does not work, then the decision of the supervisory authority can be appealed either according to administrative or legal procedure. This is authorized by item 56.1 of the TCU.
