Blame yourself: FTS wants tougher monitoring of self-employed hiring by businesses
In 2025, taxpayers will be called back to payroll commissions, the Federal Tax Service warns. The point is that business has begun to abuse the self-employment regime, a source in the Federal Tax Service stated in a conversation with Izvestia. Experts explain that it is more profitable for organizations to work with the self-employed and save on personal income tax, insurance contributions and social payments. The Federal Tax Service was concerned about this situation and issued a document "On interaction with taxpayers of tax on professional income", in which it warned of inspections in case of detection of substitution of labor relations. According to experts, business goes to tax optimization because of the economy, ease of registration and the ability to apply a variety of skills and experience of the self-employed. Details - in the material "Izvestia".
Substitution criteria
Organizations should independently assess the possible risks when engaging the self-employed to perform work, warns the Federal Tax Service of Russia in its new clarification, which was read by "Izvestia". Payers of tax on professional income (PIT) payers are prohibited from reflecting income that was received during labor relations. The Federal Tax Service has also specified the criteria indicating the substitution of labor relations with civil law relations.
The criteria for substituting employment relationships include the schedule of frequency of payments, the volume of payments in respect of NIT payers, the proportion of income from the total income of NIT payers, the permanence of relationships with organizations, the previous places of work of the self-employed and the links between current customers of NIT taxpayers and their former employers, etc. The Federal Tax Service has also indicated criteria indicating that employment relationships have been substituted for civil law relationships.
Thus, the Federal Tax Service explains, the assessment of the economic activity of the organization goes in conjunction with the application of risk-oriented approach. And the company's compliance with these criteria can be the basis for tax control measures.
In 2025, taxpayers will be summoned to salary commissions again, Alexander Usov, a member of the expert council at the Federal Tax Service of Russia on improving the practice of application of legislation on insolvency (bankruptcy), an expert at Alliance Partners Group LLC, told Izvestia.
Now each region has average industry indicators of wage payments in various industries. On the basis of these indicators, taxpayers are selected, who have them lower. They are called to give explanations, if they were able to objectively explain why the organization pays less than the minimum wage, the question may be removed. If not, additional tax control measures may be appointed, the interlocutor notes.
At the same time, tax savings through the use of self-employed labor in Russia is not unique, says Albert Bakhtizin, Director of the Central Economic and Mathematical Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an expert of the State Council of the Russian Federation. For example, a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research (USA), which processed the tax returns of French self-employed, showed the use of a simplified reporting system for tax evasion, as well as a noticeable amount of false income data.
- On the other hand, some studies have also noted that tax evasion by the self-employed contributes to the welfare of the latter and increases aggregate demand. Of course, up to a certain limit," Bakhtizin noted.
Business schemes
Vladimir Buyev, General Director of the Autonomous Nonprofit Organization "National Institute for Systemic Studies of Entrepreneurship Problems" (NISSIPP), explains that the schemes of transferring full-time employees to the self-employed are mostly used by small and partly medium-sized enterprises - the level of trust and informality is important here. It is difficult to play with this in large companies (you cannot attract hundreds or thousands of self-employed people to work).
- Another point is that it is difficult for small businesses to argue with the tax authorities, it is more expensive," says Vladimir Buyev. - If you dispute one thing, they will find another. Therefore, the "fight" now goes in such a way that the tax authorities simply charge additional taxes and social payments if they find labor relations in self-employment, and the business pays them.
At present, an employer cannot employ a self-employed person if he or she has been employed by the employer for a certain period of time. Therefore, in practice, the scheme is applied in the following way: employers cross "exchange" "former" employees and pay them, and the fact that the work is done, everything remains as it was, says Buev.
Vadim Zasko, dean of the Faculty of Taxes, Audit and Business Analysis of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, states that the problem of substitution of labor relations through the formal use of the labor of the self-employed has become quite widespread.
- It should be noted that this is not a new invention of unscrupulous taxpayers, but rather a development of the history with individual entrepreneurs, - reminds Zasko. - It means that even before the introduction of tax on professional income (taxation of the self-employed), a number of business representatives, wishing to reduce the fiscal burden on the payroll, sought to "shift" the performance of labor obligations to persons registered as individual entrepreneurs. And it came to the point that even company directors were registered as sole proprietors.
The expert notes that labor inspections are involved in the process of substitution today. After all, in addition to the rather tangible loss of revenues of the budget system of the Russian Federation (in fact, every ruble of wages is lost up to 22-25 kopecks of fiscal payments), the employees themselves are excluded from a number of measures of state social security and support: pensions, sick leave, and tax deductions for personal income tax. And this is the direct interest of labor inspections - control over the observance of workers' rights, he emphasizes.
Georgy Tolmachev, head of the corporate and tax practice of O2 Consulting's Private Wealthy Clients practice, points out that in fact "the question of the methods of the state's fight against tax evasion is very complicated." Given the fact that the problem remains unsolved for many years, it can be assumed that a truly effective method has not yet been found, he believes. The expert believes that if different approaches to the taxation of personal income - under labor and civil contracts - are maintained, the problem will persist.
Oksana Ananyeva, a leading legal adviser of ICPCN-Consultant, said that currently the Federal Tax Service uses a special scoring system to combat the substitution of full-time employees by the self-employed. This is an automated system that analyzes more than 20 parameters of the company's work: the dynamics of changes in the number of employees, the volume of payments to the self-employed, the frequency of payments, their sources, the number of customers of the self-employed, the permanence of the relationship between the parties, the relationship between the self-employed, their clients and former employers, etc. If such analysis reveals signs of violations, the organization falls into the risk group. A notification is sent to it. If after that the company does not clarify its taxes, the inspectorate requests explanations, summons the self-employed and their customers for questioning, analyzes documents and conducts desk and field audits, based on the results of which, in case of violations, the organization is brought to tax liability.
- Practice has shown that this method of fighting is effective, and the percentage of violations has decreased," Ananyeva said. - Many organizations clarify their tax obligations already at the stage of receiving notifications. According to the Federal Tax Service, the share of organizations that fell into the risk group from 2020 to 2023 fell from 3.6% to 0.7%.
Olga Ten, HR Director of the audit and consulting network FinExpertiza, notes that the involvement of the self-employed is an optimal solution in industries where it is necessary to adapt quickly to changes in the market or where there are seasonal jobs.
- There is a universal indicator: if the ratio of the number of full-time employees and the number of contracts with the self-employed, taking into account the type of activity of the organization is within the adequate norm, then it is not necessary to say that the business is deliberately avoiding registration in the staff, - says Ten.
Lawyer of Afonin, Bozhor and Partners Mikhail Bozhor doubts that the letter of the Federal Tax Service will cause the emergence of some new tax schemes: most likely, those who will see risks for themselves in the new criteria for assessing companies by the Federal Tax Service, will return to the "gray" zone with the payment of cash or settlements in cryptocurrency. Conscientious taxpayers who engage the self-employed on an occasional basis to carry out a certain amount of work are not affected by the Federal Tax Service's clarifications.
