Polish tax law – What do you need to know?

The tax is a public law, gratuitous, compulsory, and non-refundable cash benefit to the state.

Taxes are the main source of revenue for the state and enable it to finance its activities. With taxes, the state can pay for, hospitals or schools, can build roads or provide social benefits. Anyone who is in a taxable situation is obliged to pay it.

All types of taxes are a whole in both legal and economic terms. They are also interrelated, making up the tax system. The tax system in Poland is primarily all taxes, which are determined by legal norms.

In a broad sense, the tax system includes:

  • national and international tax law, including criminal fiscal law;
  • governmental and local administration bodies.

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The Polish tax system, as well as all rules related to it, are defined in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland and the Tax Ordinance. According to the law, both the imposition of obligations, taxes, tributes, exemptions, as well as the determination of rates and entities subject to the obligation are allowed only by law. 

Public law benefits can be divided into several types, such as Indirect taxes and direct taxes. The difference between the two categories is that indirect taxes are not paid at the tax office, but when purchasing goods or services, while direct taxes are paid directly by the taxpayer and are paid to the tax office. Currently in Poland there are more than a dozen types of taxes. Most of them are direct taxes.

Direct taxes in Poland include PIT (personal income tax) and CIT (corporate income tax). In addition, also inheritance and gift tax, tax on legal transactions, or real estate taxes.

In addition to direct taxes, there are the previously mentioned indirect taxes. These include:

  • VAT –  value-added tax,
  • excise tax,
  • gaming tax.

You can’t forget, that in Poland there are fees that, in theory, are also considered taxes. These include social security contributions, customs duty, sugar tax, rain tax, trade tax or tax on alcohol in small bottles. In addition, there is also a solidarity tribute, fuel tax, garbage tax and recycling fee.

Taxes in Poland do not differ significantly from taxes in other European countries.

The tax system has a significant impact on the life (including the wallet) of not only ordinary citizens but also people running businesses. For this reason, it is important that the tax law is stable and undergoes as little change as possible. This, of course, is not entirely possible, which is why it is so important to have the help of specialists, including tax advisors, who can support with their knowledge of taxes in Poland.

A tax adviser is a profession of public trust. A prerequisite for practicing the profession of a tax advisor is having high qualifications – higher education, specialist knowledge, as well as extensive experience in widely understood financial law and other areas of law.

A tax advisor must have high qualifications confirmed by a passed state examination.

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

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