Our platform has all the tools you need to do your accounting yourself.
Our platform has all the tools you need to do your accounting yourself.
Our platform has all the tools you need to do your accounting yourself.
Our platform has all the tools you need to do your accounting yourself.
Hello!
I was wondering if anyone could give me a clear answer on when I need to draw up a form 281.50? Is it correct that I need to draw this up for all Belgian companies that are not subject to VAT and to foreign companies? Or are there other companies that are eligible for this?
And can I also do this via Dexxter? Or perhaps this could be a tool that could be developed within Dexxter?
Thanks in advance!
Hello Senne,
Giel from the Dexxter team here!
As this question remains unanswered for the time being, I would like to share an article from our partner "My tips and advice". I am sharing it here because it provides a lot of information about when you need to submit 281.50 forms, when you don't, what needs to be on them, etc. As mentioned, credits to "My tips and advice" for this article. I have copied and pasted it below:
""Tax forms 281.50 must be submitted by 29.06.2022 at the latest!In this year, you must again complete forms 281.50 for fees, commissions, allowances, benefits of any kind, etc. that you paid to 'third parties' in 2021. For whom do you need to prepare such a form? For whom not? What is new this year? And what are the possible penalties if you do not prepare the forms?
Commissions, brokerage fees, trade or other rebates, incidental or non-incidental fees or honoraria, gratuities, allowances or benefits from any kind that are taxable professional income for the recipients, whether or not in Belgium, are only accepted as professional expenses if they are justified by individual forms and a summary statement submitted in the form and within the term determined by the King (Art. 57, paragraph 1 WIB 92, as edited by the Act of 21 January 2022 containing various tax provisions – Belgian Official Gazette 28 January 2022) You must therefore complete forms 281.50 for all payments and benefits of any kind that your company paid to self-employed service providers in the 2021 calendar year. If you fail to do so, these costs will not be deductible for you.
For whom do you not have to submit 281.50 forms?
Remuneration ≤ €125. You do not need to submit a form for fees, commissions or other benefits granted where the total amount or total value per recipient and per calendar year does not exceed €125 excluding vAT (Comm. IB 57/64).
Regular invoice. The tax authorities also accept that you do not have to create a form for fees or commissions for which you have received a regular vAT invoice from a company that is subject to Belgian accounting legislation.
Liberal professionals. Since 1 November 2018, liberal professionals without a company are also subject to accounting legislation (Art. III.82, §1, paragraph 1, 1° and Art. I.1, 1° a WER) and must therefore draw up a VAT-compliant invoice. You do not need to draw up tax forms for such fees.Attention! Liberal professionals who are exempted from VAT (e.g. doctors, physiotherapists, nurses, etc.) do not, in principle, issue invoices with VAT. For this category, form 281.50 must therefore still be issued.In the case of a Belgian sole proprietor, you must in principle always draw up a 281.50 form if that sole proprietor is a profit-making entity and you have not received on a VAT-compliant invoice.
Business gifts. If, in 2021, you gave a business gift from more than €125 (including vAT) to a particular customer, supplier or other business partner, the tax authorities will consider this to be a 'benefit in kind'... In principle, you must then draw up a 281.50 form, which means that the business relation is taxed on it and the gift becomes 100% deductible for your company. It is better to invite them to a top restaurant, for example. You will not have to draw up a tax form and 69% of the cost will be tax-deductible. New regulations Reducing administrative burdens Foreign companies.For payments to foreign companies, a form always had to be completed (parliamentary question no. 8, Wouters, 08.12.2014). This is because foreign companies are not subject to Belgian accounting law. In order to reduce the administrative burden associated with this tax reporting obligation, the 'Act containing various tax provisions' (Act of 21.01.2022 containing various tax provisions – Belgian Official Gazette 28.01.2022) abolishes the obligation to submit 281.50 forms if an invoice or document has actually been issued in its place by a taxpayer established in the territory of the European Economic Area (European Union + Norway + Iceland + Liechtenstein). This rule applies to all payments made from 1 January 2021 onwards.
Possibility to increase the threshold from €125 to a maximum of €1,000 by Royal Decree
This new law also provides for the possibility for the King to increase the threshold for which no 281.50 forms need to be submitted, by a maximum of €1,000 per beneficiary per calendar year (Art. 57, paragraph 4 WIB 92, as introduced by the Act of 21 January 2022 containing various tax provisions – Belgian Official Gazette 28 January 2022).
Attention! However, at the time of writing, no Royal Decree has yet been published, which means that the €125 threshold still applies.
Practical tips
How to submit?
Electronic submission of the forms has been required since 2009 (as for forms 281.10) and is done via the Belcotax-on-web system (BOW) ( https://financien.belgium.be/nl/E-services/Belcotaxonweb ). An exception is only possible if the debtor of the income 'does not have the necessary computerised resources to comply with this obligation' (Art. 30, §2 KB/WIB 92). When submitting the 281.50 forms electronically via 'Belcotax-on-web', it is no longer necessary to submit a 325.50 form. The Administration automatically extracts the data it previously obtained from a 325 form from the submitted 281.50 forms.What if in doubt?
When making payments of income that could be professional income or miscellaneous income ('occasional profit or gain') on behalf of the recipient, the tax authorities expect you to always draw up a form if you cannot determine with certainty the classification of the income at the time of payment. According to the tax authorities, it is then up to the recipient to create whether the income constitutes professional income or miscellaneous income. This may depend on the specific situation from which the recipient derives his income (e.g. occasional vs. regular services).
By when?
The forms must be completed per calendar year, even if your company's financial year does not coincide with the calendar year. The forms and summary statement must be submitted to the competent services before 30 June from the year following that to which these documents relate (Art. 30, §3, KB/WIB 92; see also message from the FPS Finance – BS 12.06.2017) For the calendar year 2021, the deadline is 29 June 2022. What if you do not prepare a form? Secret commission The remuneration is then not deductible. In addition, the tax authorities may subject these allowances to a separate assessment for secret commissions (Art. 219 WIB 92) in corporation tax. Since the 2020 income year, these amounts have been 100% or 50% (if the beneficiary is subject to corporation tax) and are no longer deductible.
Tip 1. If you can demonstrate that the recipient has included the fees in their Belgian or foreign (timely submitted) private tax return (Art. 219, paragraph 6 WIB 92), then the secret commission levy is not payable and these costs are deductible.
Tip 2. The tax will not be levied if you unambiguously identify the recipient of the fee within two years and six months from 1 January of the relevant year (Art. 219, paragraph 7 WIB 92) . The costs are then deductible insofar as you comply with Article 49.
Penalties
In addition, administrative penalties ranging from €50 (for a first offence) to a maximum of €1,250 (Art. 445 WIB 92) are systematically imposed for any failure to submit any form.
You must prepare tax forms 281.50 by 29 June 2022 at the latest for fees paid by your company in 2021 for which it did not receive a vAT invoice. However, you do not need to prepare a form if the total value per recipient and per calendar year amounts to no more than €125 (excluding vAT). For payments made from 1 January 2021 to a company established in the European Economic Area, the obligation to draw up a form 281.50 does not apply if an invoice (or document in its place) has actually been issued. For business gifts whose value amounts to more than €125 (including vAT), you are also required to draw up a form. If you forget to draw up the form, the tax authorities may impose administrative fines, reject the costs and establish a secret commission tax assessment.Thank you for this answer! BAm I correct in assuming that I only need to draw up these forms when, for example, I have received on invoices from a fellow student entrepreneur who is also VAT exempted OR from a foreign company that is not part of the European Economic Area (e.g. the United Kingdom)?
I have noticed that I am currently received on a particularly large number of forms, which is why I suspect that my sole proprietors and associated invoices are being regarded as 'non-vAT-compliant invoices'. Is this possible?
You really should try it out for yourself. Even if you don’t have a company number yet, you can already go ahead.
