And this year's 'Tax Watch' awards go to ...
The mixed-up publication schedule over the holiday season means that I only get to do my End Of Year column in the middle of January, and what a peculiar old year 2000 was for your humble tax columnist. So stand by for the Third Annual Tax Watch Awards Column, where we award prizes of unbelievable value to anyone who has been fortunate enough to amuse your columnist this year. Apologies if the name-dropping makes it seem as full of in-jokes as a school magazine but in some cases it was unavoidable.
Tax Loophole Closing Of The Year
As recounted a few weeks ago, changes to the taxation of management contracts for Polish nationals have significantly narrowed a similar loophole for expatriates without this being the apparent intention or realization of the Finance Ministry. The letter saying "Dear Ministry, can we have our loophole back?" still sits on my desk, as I weigh up whether pointing this out and asking for it back makes them realize how generous they were before.
Expatriate Celebrity Award
This one goes to Tim Hyland of Travel Express. As many of you know, Travel Express is a frequent sponsor of WBJ Business Mixers. Tim is seen dispensing tickets as prizes at mixers, so many in the expat community seem to know who he is. At afforementioned Mixer, I get a wave and a "Hi Peter" from Tim from the other side of the bar, reciprocated with a "Yo, Tim." It was only afterward that I remembered we had not yet formally met nor been introduced, he knows me only from this photo, and I knew him only from seeing him draw the prizes at the mixers. Real celebs must get this all the time of course, but it's the only time it's ever happened to me.
I recounted this story to Zdzislaw and made some immodest comment about being famous. Zdzislaw reminds me that Serial Killers are typically pretty well known as well, and don't have to study so many years at college. So if that was my sole motivation then, have I been spending my time effectively?
Ultimate Professionals Award
I know one shouldn't award oneself anything in one's own column, so this one I award jointly to both myself and Larry Darby, Chairman Emeritus of the Tax Committee of the British Polish Chamber Of Commerce (a position he bequeathed to me on his triumphant return home last summer). Between us, we managed to get through the entire year without having a single meeting of the BPCC Tax Committee, which we were supposed to be chairing. This shabby state of affairs has been rectified by me, firing myself from this position. As honorable, cricket-watching Englishmen, at least we had the decency not to charge in our lunch expenses for our planning meetings.
Guaranteed To Drive
Me Crazy Award
This one goes jointly to all of the politicians, too many to name, who claim that the government is being systematically ripped off by all of these foreigners in Poland who don't pay tax. If nobody is paying, how come our expatriate taxation group is so busy? And even those that don't are being charged VAT every time they spend money in Poland. It's good to see that all Polish companies are obviously now paying their taxes and other state budget obligations on time, as they never receive these complaints.
It's not fair award
This goes to Matt Morgan from Stoney Point Java, who still refuses to lift the ban on my sitting on the comfy couch at the afforementioned coffee emporium. This ban has reached ridiculous proportions, with recent suggestions that even standing near the couch could lead to eviction. Some of Poland's leading Human Rights lawyers are looking at whether this ban is constitutional or not. I hereby issue this challenge to Morgan justify this outrageous ban, or face the prospect of several more complaints in the Business Journal tax column.
"Would you do this
at home?" award
This goes to everyone this year who has suggested that they could invoice their employer from a company in Cyprus that isn't owned by them, honest, so that they can then not declare the income for Polish tax purposes. I still can't see how "please pay me in a way that makes it easy for me to cheat on my taxes" will ever get someone a job as a CFO of a respectable company or is that why I'm still in this job while all those around me are getting rich?
Unintended flattery from
the tax office award
As part of a client's recent tax audit, the tax controllers were making their way through a particular minefield of messy-ness and complexity. Their solution? To ask us for a letter saying that it had all been done properly, "because we know that a firm like yours can't say something like that if it's not true." Maybe after all of these years we are starting at last to see that the tax office actually appreciates the role of professional, independent tax advisers after all. What a good note to start the new year on!
Peter Ferrigno is a partner in the Warsaw office of Arthur Andersen. Alex Knight and Abigail Greef are managers in the U.S. tax group in Arthur Andersen's Brussels office, specializing in U.S. taxes for U.S. and non-U.S. individuals working in Poland and Central Europe.
