The Ministry of Finance of Russia and the Federal Tax Service of Russia (letter of the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated March 4, 2013 No. 03-07-15/6333 (letter of the Federal Tax Service of Russia dated April 3, 2013 No. ED-4-3 / [email protected] communicated to the tax inspectorates)) have finally accepted the point of view of the courts regarding the application of VAT to the amounts of penalties received by the seller for late fulfillment of obligations under supply contracts: these amounts do not need to be included in the tax base for value added tax.
Until recently, the issue of imposing value added tax on penalties received by the seller of goods (works, services) for violating the terms of contracts remained controversial. Officials in their letters (letters of the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated August 17, 2012 No. 03-07-11/311, dated July 23, 2012 No. 03-07-08/204, dated May 18, 2012 No. 03-07-11/146, dated February 14. 2012 No. 03-07-11/41, dated 08/09/2011 No. 03-07-11/214, dated 05/20/2010 No. 03-07-11/189, dated 09/11/2009 No. 03-07-11/222, dated 06.03.2009 No. 03-07-11/54, Federal Tax Service of Russia dated 09.08.2011 No. AS-4-3 / [email protected] ) indicated that sellers should include the amounts of penalties in the VAT tax base, since the latter are associated with calculations for payment for goods sold (work, services). They justified their position by the fact that the received amounts of penalties (fines, penalties) fall under subclause 2 of clause 1 of Article 162 of the Tax Code. Let us recall that, according to this norm, the VAT tax base increases by amounts “... received for sold goods (work, services) in the form of financial assistance, to replenish special-purpose funds, to increase income, or otherwise related to payment for sold goods (work, services) services)".
