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- True evidence: the authorities are covering up a tax avoidance scheme popular with small businesses
True evidence: the authorities are covering up a tax avoidance scheme popular with small businesses
Against the background of the policy of whitewashing the economy, the authorities are strengthening control over small businesses. They began to check him more harshly for attempts to avoid paying VAT through the closure and reopening of individual entrepreneurs, Izvestia found out. Now it will not be possible to reset the limits in this way — the income will be counted in total for the entire year, even after the company's re-registration. If the tax service decides that the company was re-registered for the sake of benefits, it may incur additional taxes, penalties and fines. After the last tightening of the rules, such schemes have become more popular: about 3 thousand are opened daily in Russia. Sole proprietors, and about 2.6 thousand are closing. How the Federal Tax Service identifies such cases and which "savings methods" are now under special control is described in the Izvestia article.
How a business evades taxes
Starting in 2025, companies and individual entrepreneurs on the simplified taxation system (USN) began to pay VAT if their annual revenue exceeds 60 million rubles. Since 2026, the threshold has been tripled to 20 million. Now significantly more small businesses are subject to the fee. Sole proprietors can choose the standard rate of 22% with the right to deduction, or preferential options — 5% (with income up to 272 million) and 7% (up to 490 million), but without the opportunity to return some of the money.
After the tightening of the rules, the business began to look for ways to reduce the workload. One of the most popular solutions was to close and reopen the sole proprietorship. There is no exact data on how often entrepreneurs use such a scheme for tax benefits, said Evgeniya Memruk, a member of the NP Opora Association, head of the Union of Accountants and Tax Consultants. However, according to her, this practice is gaining momentum, and the number of questions from entrepreneurs and accountants on this topic has increased significantly. According to the observations of the Federal Tax Service, the number of individual entrepreneur registrations increased last year, which may also be due to the use of such mechanisms, the expert added.
The meaning of the scheme is to reset the VAT limits. When income approaches the threshold, an entrepreneur closes an individual entrepreneur, and then registers a new one with a clean income history, explained Ekaterina Kosareva, managing partner of the VMT Consult agency.
Business re-registration is also used for other reasons. For example, to change the tax regime, she added. It is possible to switch to some of them only from the beginning of the year, so entrepreneurs sometimes have to re-register a company if the previous option turned out to be unprofitable. Another reason is the restart in another region for the sake of local benefits and more lenient conditions, said Natalia Milchakova, a leading analyst at Freedom Finance Global.
The scheme is used quite often, although it is not yet widespread, the expert said. According to recent data from the Federal Tax Service, which was studied by Izvestia, in the first quarter of 2026, more than 278 thousand new sole proprietors were registered in Russia, and about 236 thousand were liquidated. Thus, on average, about 3 thousand new businesses were opened in the country per day, and about 2.6 thousand were closed. With such dynamics, the presence of one-day firms cannot be ruled out, Natalia Milchakova emphasized.
The tax authorities have become more attentive in recent years to monitor such situations, said Evgenia Sabitova, a member of the Union of Lawyers and Bloggers. According to her, this is due to the development of digital control systems and automatic data reconciliation. Increased inspections have become part of the government's policy to whitewash the economy and combat business withdrawal to the gray zone.
The Ministry of Finance also drew attention to this. A January letter from the Department of Tax Policy of the department (published in March) states: an entrepreneur on the USN is exempt from VAT if the income for the previous calendar year did not exceed the established limit. At the same time, the legislation does not provide for a separate procedure for calculating revenue for cases when an individual entrepreneur is closed and re-registered during the same year.
The ministry warned: if the tax service determines that the main purpose of the renewal was non—payment or reduction of the fee, the business may be charged additional VAT based on real obligations - as if there had been no closure and re-registration.
This position was also confirmed by the Federal Tax Service. In its April letter, the service indicated that if an individual entrepreneur is re-registered on a patent, the entrepreneur's income will be summed up for the entire year, and the limits will not start counting again after the business is re-registered. The editorial board sent requests to the Ministry of Finance and the tax Service.
The Federal Tax Service is systematically working to curb tax optimization and evasion schemes, the press service of the Ministry of Finance told the editorial board. The specified letter from the department does not give the service additional powers, it only describes the current procedure for the activities of tax authorities, they clarified.
How to punish for tax fraud
The Federal Tax Service and the Ministry of Finance consider such actions as a possible fragmentation of the business and an attempt to avoid taxes if the actual activities of the company continue unchanged, said Yaroslav Kabakov, Director of Strategy at Finam IC.
According to him, the tax service now evaluates not the fact of the closure of the sole proprietor, but the real picture of the business. They check clients, employees, addresses, cash registers, bank accounts, websites, and money movement. If an entrepreneur simply re-registered his business with a new sole proprietor without stopping work, this may be recognized as a fictitious re-registration, the expert explained.
In this case, the business will be charged additional VAT and taxes according to the general system, as well as penalties and fines — 20% of the amount of arrears. If the inspection proves intent, the fine may rise to 40%. With large sums, criminal liability is also possible, Yaroslav Kabakov warned.
If the tax service confirms that the re-registration was carried out for the illegal application of preferential treatment, the obligations will be recalculated according to the general taxation system, added Ekaterina Golubtsova, Associate Professor of the Department of State and Municipal Finance at Plekhanov Russian University of Economics. In addition, penalties are charged for each day of delay, based on 1/300 of the Central Bank's key rate of the debt amount.
At the same time, the opening of a new sole proprietor after the closure of the previous one is not considered a violation, said lawyer Evgenia Sabitova. However, the tax authorities analyze a set of criteria: whether the former customers, employees, address, equipment, websites, current accounts, counterparties, and business processes are preserved.
There are other signs that inspectors may suspect a fictitious scheme, Natalia Milchakova noted. For example, if there were no objective reasons to close the old sole proprietor, such as bankruptcy, a change of business, or the death of the owner. Suspicion is also aroused by the situation when an old sole proprietor is closed, and a new one opens almost immediately, especially if the income is close to the VAT limit. Another alarming signal is the transfer of funds from a new business to the accounts of the former one or the presence of similar claims from the tax authorities in the past.
What other schemes attract the attention of the Federal Tax Service
One of the most popular tax reduction schemes remains business fragmentation — it is used to avoid exceeding VAT limits and preserve the right to a tax refund, said Ekaterina Kosareva from VMT Consult.
According to her, new businesses are often registered to relatives — spouses, parents or children. Family business in itself is not prohibited, however, the tax may have questions if several sole proprietors are engaged in the same activity. For example, they own a chain of grocery stores. If the directions are different (a children's center, a hardware repair and a coffee shop), there are usually no complaints, the lawyer shared.
Another way to illegally reduce payments is to hide part of the proceeds through inflated fines and penalties, Ekaterina Kosareva added. For example, a supply contract is concluded for 1 million, and a fine for violating the terms is prescribed for 4 million. In such cases, the Federal Tax Service compares the terms with similar transactions on the market and draws attention to unreasonably large sanctions.
There may be other signs of business fragmentation, said Evgenia Memruk from NP Opora. These include unified management of several companies, common employees and infrastructure, identical addresses, websites, phone numbers and IP addresses, as well as the redistribution of revenue and customers between different sole proprietors.
According to the lawyer, the benefits of such schemes are significant. Entrepreneurs can illegally save about 5% of their revenue by evading VAT, as well as another 3-7% of their profits by using simplified taxation instead of the general taxation system.
The tax service also pays special attention to the substitution of self-employed employment, underestimation of revenue and fictitious document management, said lawyer Evgenia Sabitova. Now the Federal Tax Service actively uses automated analysis systems, data from banks, online sales registers and interdepartmental information exchange, so it has become easier to identify such violations.
Savings for businesses using such schemes can reach millions of rubles a year, but at the same time the risks are also growing, experts warn. If violations are detected, an entrepreneur faces large additional charges, account blocking, on-site inspections and lengthy legal disputes, so attempts to save on taxes may end up costing significantly more than the benefits received.
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