Tax authorities’ right to conduct audits beyond a now high court-prescribed five-year statute of limitations was further curtailed this week with another Council of State (CoS) decision.
Based on the relevant ruling (172/2018), an anonymous accusation leveled at a citizen or business for tax code violations beyond the five-year statute of limitations cannot be considered as “supplementary evidence” that was ostensibly not in the possession of tax authorities during the five-year period in which the latter are legally authorized to conduct such audits.
A landmark decision by the CoS, Greece’s highest administrative court, ended a long-standing regime by which the Greek tax bureau – which has been succeeded by the Independent Public Revenues Authority – could continue to keep open cases of alleged tax evasion or fraud over decades, and even after business entities have transferred ownership or closed.
