Arbitration courts are seeing the practice of refusing to refund to businesses the funds that form the surplus balance of the unified tax account (UTA). Alexey Stanchin, head of the Tax Compliance practice, commented on the reasons for such decisions in the Vedomosti newspaper. 

We are talking about situations when a taxpayer transferred funds to the Unified Tax Account not for the purpose of paying taxes and levies, but to improve bank compliance. In such cases, the amount transferred exceeded many times the amount of its current or forthcoming liabilities. The number of such litigations has increased recently. 

For example, in case A60-13370/2024, the transfer of funds to the STS took place in connection with the closure of a settlement account with a bank, and the tax authority's arguments focused on the possible transit nature of the transactions and signs that pointed to the technical nature of the organisation. 

At present, the legal basis for refusing a refund is the absence of a positive balance, our expert notes. At the same time, a new criterion for separating tax and non-tax payments is appearing in court practice - correlation of the transferred amount with the amount of future liabilities to the Federal Tax Service. 

So-called ‘technical’ companies can use such transactions with the Unified Tax System to bypass bank compliance and improve the indicators required to comply with the 115-FZ and the ‘Know Your Client’ system, which divides companies into red, yellow and green depending on the risks according to the traffic light principle. Typically, money is transferred to an ENS and then an application is made to dispose of the surplus, the bank's system recognises these funds as more ‘safe’ as they are received from the tax authority. 

The Tax Compliance team will continue to monitor the development of the case law.