Deadlines for submitting documents upon request of the tax authorities

Document submission methods

If various documents were required during the desk audit, they can be provided to the tax office in the following ways (subclause 1, clause 2, article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation):

• paper certified photocopies are transferred personally by the taxpayer or through a representative to the tax office or by registered mail by mail (subclause 2, clause 2, article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• in electronic form in a special format and in accordance with the procedure approved by order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated February 17, 2011 No. ММВ-7-2/ [email protected] ;
• in electronic form through the taxpayer’s personal account;
• in the form of scanned images via TKS or through the taxpayer’s personal account.

The taxpayer himself has the right to choose which method to transfer documents to him at the requests and requirements of tax authorities (letter of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated November 25, 2014 No. ED-4-2/24315).

NOTE! Taxpayers who are required to submit reports only electronically do not have the right to send notifications about the impossibility of submitting the documents requested by the Federal Tax Service by mail.

See here for details.

IMPORTANT! Explanations for VAT can only be submitted in electronic format. See this article for details.

Find out what opportunities electronic personal accounts provide from the following materials:

• “The procedure for filling out the 3-NDFL declaration in your personal account”;
• “Plato system - user’s personal account (nuances)”.

The list of documents that the Federal Tax Service may require depends on the type of event carried out by the tax authorities. What documents to prepare as part of inspections (on-site or office), outside inspections, during counter inspections, ConsultantPlus experts tell in detail. Get trial access and start exploring the Ready Solution for free.

The procedure for requesting documents by the tax authority

To request documents, the tax inspectors conducting the audit must serve you with a demand for documents. The request must indicate which documents are required and on the basis of which article of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation, within what time period and in what form they must be submitted.

During a desk audit of a tax return, additional documents may be requested only in the following situations:

• if tax benefits are declared in the declaration, documents confirming the right to benefits may be requested (clause 6 of Article 88 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• a declaration on water tax has been submitted - documents that are the basis for calculating the tax may be requested (clause 9 of Article 88 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• Errors are found in the declaration or it is revealed that the information contained in the declaration contradicts the information from the documents you submitted, the information contained in the declaration does not correspond to the information from the documents available to the inspection - clarifications may be requested (clauses 3, 4 Article 88 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

Note. As a general rule, tax authorities do not have the right to repeatedly demand from you documents that you have previously submitted to the inspectorate when conducting a tax audit against you (Clause 5 of Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation). There are two exceptions to this rule. Thus, tax inspectors will be able to request documents from you again in the following cases:

• if you presented these documents only in the form of originals, which were then returned to you;
• The tax authority has lost the documents you submitted due to force majeure circumstances.

You are not required to submit documents to the tax office:

• after three months from the date of submission of the declaration (clause 2 of article 88 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• not related to the declaration being verified (Resolution of the Presidium of the Supreme Arbitration Court of the Russian Federation dated 04/08/2008 N 15333/07);
• if the law does not oblige you to prepare or have them (analytical reports, explanations of the causes of losses, etc.);
• if the request for the production of documents was improperly served, i.e. handed to a person who is not authorized to do so by a power of attorney (paragraph 2, paragraph 1, article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• if it is unclear from the requirement what documents need to be submitted.

Submission of documents in electronic form

You can transfer the required documents to tax authorities in paperless form via telecommunication channels (TCS) using an enhanced qualified electronic signature (ECES) through an electronic document management operator (EDO) or through the website of the Federal Tax Service of Russia (for details about this method, see the link ).

Find out how to obtain an electronic signature from the publication .

Thanks to this opportunity you:

• avoid technical errors by using electronic formats;
• save your resources (no need to print documents and come to the inspection or post office to transfer (send) them);
• You are guaranteed to receive confirmation of document delivery.

To prepare and submit documents you have:

• 5 working days if the tax authorities are waiting for documents (information) from you about a specific transaction or counterparty in respect of which an audit is being carried out;
• 10 working days if documents are requested as part of a desk or on-site inspection of your company.

The deadlines are counted from the date of receipt of the request for the submission of documents.

Scanned images of paper documents: what to look for when presenting them

When submitting scanned images of documents drawn up on paper to tax authorities, be guided by:

• per paragraph 4 p. 2 tbsp. 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation, which allows you to submit paper documents in electronic form in the form of electronic images of documents (documents drawn up on paper, converted into electronic form by scanning while preserving their details);
• Order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated January 18, 2017 No. ММВ-7-6/ [email protected] , which approved a universal inventory format for transferring scanned copies of documents to the tax office, allowing you to send scans of any papers to tax authorities;
• Federal Tax Service letter No. ED-4-2/ [email protected] , which notes the possibility of submitting any documents to the Federal Tax Service in electronic form using any software, if they are compiled in accordance with the formats established by the Federal Tax Service.

When deciding on the form in which to submit the requested documents to the tax authorities, do not forget that the tax authorities accept certain documents exclusively in electronic form. Find out more about this by following the link .

Electronic documents

If the requested documents are compiled in electronic form in established formats, then the taxpayer has the right to send them to the inspectorate in electronic form via telecommunication channels (TCS) (paragraph 3, paragraph 2, article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

The procedure for sending a request for the submission of documents (information) and submitting documents (information) at the request of the tax authority in electronic form via telecommunication channels was approved by Order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated February 17, 2011 N ММВ-7-2/ [email protected] (hereinafter referred to as the Procedure).

The taxpayer receives within the next business day after sending the requested document in electronic form (clause 21 of the Procedure)

• 1) confirmation of the date of dispatch;
• 2) receipt of admission or notice of refusal of admission.

When you receive a receipt from the inspection for accepting a document in electronic form, there is no need to submit this document to the inspection on paper (clause 5 of the Procedure). If you have not received a receipt, then the requested document must be sent to the inspection on paper within the prescribed period (clause 24 of the Procedure).

Please note that submission of documents in electronic form is allowed only if they are compiled in accordance with the formats established by the Federal Tax Service of Russia. If documents are compiled in electronic form not in established formats, then they should be printed on paper and submitted to the tax authority in the form of certified copies. This was indicated in Letters of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated 09.09.2015 N SA-4-7/15871, dated 09.07.2015 N ED-4-2/15669, dated 05.29.2013 N ED-4-3/ [email protected] and Ministry of Finance of Russia dated January 11, 2012 N 03-02-07/1-1, dated January 11, 2012 N 03-02-07/1-2.

For your information. At the end of May 2015, draft federal law N 688389-6 “On Amendments to the Tax Code of the Russian Federation in terms of improving tax administration” was adopted in the first reading. The document addresses the procedure for submitting requested documents to the tax authorities in electronic form. It is proposed that the person being inspected be entrusted with the obligation to list the submitted documents in the inventory, indicating the name and individual characteristics of each document.

How to sign photocopies of documents

If documents are submitted in paper form, then a number of rules should be followed.

Photocopies of documents must be certified by the manager or other authorized person. You can also seal them if the organization has one. But this is optional. Tax officials allow not to certify the submitted copies with a seal, even if the company or individual entrepreneur has not abandoned the seal in its activities (letter of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated 08/05/2015 No. BS-4-17 / [email protected] ).

The authorized person acts on the basis of a power of attorney issued by the manager. The power of attorney must be drawn up in accordance with the requirements of the law (Articles 185-189 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation and subparagraph 1, paragraph 3, Article 29 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

The signature on the photocopies is affixed in accordance with the registration procedure defined in clause 3.26 of GOST R 6.30-2003 (Resolution of the State Standard of Russia dated 03.03.2003 No. 65-st). This standard specifies the order in which the labels should appear. It looks like this:

Right

Position of the certifier Personal signature Initials, surname

date

It is necessary to take into account that the established procedure is advisory in nature, therefore it is considered optional (subclause 4, clause 1 of GOST R 6.30-2003). Thus, inscriptions can be located anywhere in the document.

For example:

Copy is right.

March 20, 2021

Smirnov

General Director of Orion LLC ———— Smirnov A.P.

M.P.

There is no need to notarize copies of documents (Clause 2, Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation). But a situation may arise when you cannot do without a notary. Find out about this in the next section.

Maintenance requirements

There are many reasons to submit information to the Federal Tax Service at the place of registration (or place of registration of taxable objects), for example:

• response to a message from the Federal Tax Service with a request to provide explanations for conducting a desk tax audit of a tax return (based on clause 3 of Article 88 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• a taxpayer’s message about submitting an updated tax return to the Federal Tax Service in connection with an incorrectly specified BCC (based on clause 1 of Article 80 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);
• a list of documents to be submitted in connection with the request received (based on clause 2 of Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

When preparing the support, the taxpayer must choose in what form - paper or electronic - he wants to send it. The procedure and form of the cover letter itself depends on this.

However, there is a list of details that must be present in it in any case (GOST R 7.0.97-2016, approved by Rosstandart of December 8, 2016 No. 2004-st). Simplified, they can be represented as follows:

• details of the sender-taxpayer (name indicating the organizational and legal form, legal address, INN/KPP, telephone). If the support is issued on a “company” letterhead, then the bank details will be indicated: current account number, name of the bank, its BIC, correspondent account;
• details of the recipient - Federal Tax Service (name and number of inspection, legal address);
• date and outgoing number with reference to the received request from the Federal Tax Service (incoming number and date);
• content (may begin with the words: “In connection with the requirement of the Federal Tax Service dated 00.00.0000 No. _ to provide written explanations for ... ____ for 2021, we report the following:”, after which the requested information is listed point by point);
• attachment (if there are attachments, then after the main text a list of attached documents is given in the form of a simple numbered list. If there are many attachments, then in this place an indication is given of the inventory, which is attached to the cover letter separately);
• signatures (usually a manager or individual entrepreneur, but there may also be a signature of an authorized representative);
• information about the contractor (usually in the lower left corner of the cover letter, after all his details the full name of the person who wrote the cover letter, his phone number, e-mail, and other details are indicated).

Since the paper form of a cover letter is not unified, using the details listed above is quite enough to compose such a letter.

Does an individual entrepreneur need to have a power of attorney certified by a notary?

If the entrepreneur’s documents for submission to the tax office are certified by an authorized person, then a power of attorney certified by a notary is required (subclause 4, clause 2, article 11, subclause 2, clause 3, article 29 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

The following people share the same opinion:

• judicial authorities (see decision of the Plenum of the Supreme Arbitration Court of the Russian Federation dated July 30, 2013 No. 57).
• officials of the Ministry of Finance (letters dated 03/24/2014 No. 03-02-08/12763, dated 08/01/2013 No. 03-02-08/30900, dated 11/15/2012 No. 03-02-08/99, dated 08/07/2009 No. 03- 02-08/66);
• tax authorities (letters from the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated August 22, 2014 No. SA-4-7/16692, dated October 16, 2013 No. ED-4-3/ [email protected] ).

How to make copies of documents

If the legislation does not provide for a copy of documents certified by a notary, then tax inspectors do not have the right to demand certified copies (subparagraph 2, paragraph 2, article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation, additionally letter of the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated December 7, 2009 No. 03-04-05-01/886 ).

Therefore, tax inspectors are provided with copies of documents certified by the manager.

A multi-page copy of the document must be bound and a single certification inscription must be placed on the firmware. The sheets are numbered and the total quantity is indicated on the certification inscription. It is necessary to stitch the sheets in such a way that subsequently there is no embroidering of the bundle, and there is free access for photocopying any sheet. All dates and signatures must be clearly visible on the copy of the document (letter from the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated 08/07/2014 No. 03-02-RZ/39142, Federal Tax Service of Russia dated 09/13/2012 No. AS-4-2 / ​​[email protected] (clause 21) ).

If there are several documents, then the copies are certified separately and a certification inscription is placed on each one. The financial department reports this in its letters dated May 11, 2012 No. 03-02-07/1-122, dated October 24, 2011 No. 03-02-07/1-374, dated November 30, 2010 No. 03-02-07/1 -549 <1>, as well as the tax department in a letter dated 10/02/2012 No. AS-4-2/16459. The judicial authorities adhere to the same position (resolution of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Moscow District dated November 5, 2009 No. KA-A41/11390-09).

—————

<1> These letters refer to counter checks. Since the conditions for submitting documents at the request of the tax authorities are the same, they can also be applied to desk audits (clause 2 of Article 93, subclause 3 of clause 5 of Article 93.1 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

You should not use used sheets to copy documents. On the reverse side there is information about the executor of the document - last name, initials and telephone number (letter dated 02/01/2010 No. 03-02-07/1-35).

ConsultantPlus expert M.A. Klimova answers about the specifics of preparing responses to the requirements of the Federal Tax Service. Get free trial access to the system and go to the video lecture.

List of documents

Tax officials do not have the right to demand from the person being inspected documents that were previously submitted to the inspectorate during desk or field audits. True, this restriction does not apply to cases where documents were previously submitted to the inspection in the form of originals, which were subsequently returned, as well as to situations where documents were lost due to force majeure (clause 5 of Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

In order to comply with the restriction on re-requesting documents, officials recommend that taxpayers submit documents with a covering letter and inventory (Letter of the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated 08/07/2014 N 03-02-РЗ/39142). If they are sent in paper form, then the inventory is drawn up in free form.

For valuable mail items, you can choose the “attachment inventory” service. In this case, a legally significant description of the contents is attached to the letter. The letter with the inventory is submitted to the post office in open form and with an inventory form filled out in two copies in accordance with Form 107 Appendix No. 1 to the Procedure for the Reception and Delivery of Domestic Registered Postal Items, approved by Order of the Federal State Unitary Enterprise Russian Post dated May 17, 2012 No. 114-p.. ​​Fill out The form can be found on the official website of the Russian Post.

If documents are sent in electronic form via TKS, then the inventory is compiled in electronic format. Order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated June 29, 2012 N ММВ-7-6/ [email protected] approved the Format of the inventory of documents sent to the inspection in electronic form via TKS, which includes the formats of the documents specified in the inventory and presented in the form of scanned images.

Demanding a scanned version of a document is illegal

The actions of tax inspectors are considered unlawful if, in addition to a certified copy of documents, a scanned version of the document on disk or in electronic form is requested.

Tax legislation does not provide for the presentation of a scanned version of a document on disk or in electronic form if a paper copy was previously provided (Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

What fines can a company expect if it fails to submit counter-verification documents, see the article “What is the fine for failure to provide counter-verification documents?” .

Find out what time frame it takes to prepare and submit documents to the tax authorities here .

We discussed in this publication when it is possible not to comply with the requirements of the tax authorities.

Results

If the tax authorities have asked you for documents, you can submit them on paper or electronically. Paper copies must be certified by the signature of the manager and sewn in a certain way, and can be brought to the tax office in person (or through a representative) or sent by registered mail.

When transferring documents electronically, you need to take into account the requirements of the order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated February 17, 2011 No. ММВ-7-2/ [email protected]

Sources:

• Tax Code of the Russian Federation
• Order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated February 17, 2011 No. ММВ-7-2/ [email protected]

You can find more complete information on the topic in ConsultantPlus. Free trial access to the system for 2 days.

How inspectors request documents

If an on-site inspection takes place on the territory of an organization, inspectors have the right to request copies of documents in writing, presenting a demand to the organization for the presentation of documents. Along with this, inspectors can verbally request original documents for review (with the consent of the organization) at the inspection site. If an organization refuses to submit original documents for review, the inspectorate will warn it of the obligation to provide inspectors with such an opportunity with a special notification.

If an on-site inspection is carried out at the location of the inspection, inspectors have the right to request documents in writing and review them at the inspection (in this case, inspectors can request from the organization both originals and copies of documents at their discretion).

In addition, in exceptional cases, regardless of the location of the on-site inspection (on the territory of the organization or at the location of the inspection), inspectors can seize documents (both copies and originals) and familiarize themselves with them at the inspection. This is stated in paragraph 12 of Article 89 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation.

If the inspection suspends the on-site tax audit, then it will be able to examine the organization’s documents only taking into account the restrictions established by tax legislation (paragraph 9, paragraph 9, article 89 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

To request documents, inspectors must send a request to the organization, the form of which was approved by order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated May 8, 2015 No. ММВ-7-2/189 (clause 1 of Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation).

The request must indicate:

• basis for requesting documents (article of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation);

• the period allotted to the organization for submitting documents;

• information about the documents requested (their type, names, details, period to which they relate);

• full and abbreviated name of the inspected organization, its INN, KPP;

• the type and period of the audit during which documents are requested (for example, an on-site audit of income tax for 2009).

This follows from Appendix 5 to the order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated May 31, 2007 No. MM-3-06/338.

The requirement to submit documents is signed by the tax inspector, who directly conducts the on-site inspection (Clause 1, Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation). It is not necessary to have the tax office stamp on the request. There is no such condition in tax legislation (Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation), and this detail is also not provided in the demand form (Appendix 15 to the order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated May 8, 2015 No. ММВ-7-2/189).

The inspection can submit a requirement to the organization in several ways:

• hand over in person against signature to a legal or authorized representative of the organization (on paper);

• send via telecommunication channels (electronically) in accordance with the Procedure approved by Order of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated February 17, 2011 No. ММВ-7-2/168.

If it is impossible to transmit the requirement by these methods, the inspection has the right to send it by registered mail. In this case, the request for the submission of documents is considered received by the organization after six working days from the date of sending the registered letter.

This procedure follows from the provisions of paragraph 1 of Article 93, paragraph 4 of Article 31, paragraph 6 of Article 6.1 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation.

Situation: can an inspection, as part of an on-site tax audit, require from an organization documents that were previously submitted as part of previous on-site (desk) audits?

As a general rule, an organization is not obliged to re-submit to the inspectorate documents that have already been transferred to it as part of previous on-site (desk) audits or tax monitoring. But there are exceptions to this rule.

The tax office may request documents again in the following cases:

• the organization submitted original documents to the inspection, which were then returned to it;

• the inspection lost previously submitted documents due to force majeure (for example, flood, fire).

Such features are provided for in paragraph 5 of Article 93 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation and apply to any documents, regardless of the date of their initial submission to the inspectorate.