Taxes and European Union

Regulations relating to indirect taxation are expected to undergo the most considerable changes, given the EU principle of the greatest possible harmonization of these regulations at the Community level. The Finance Ministry has already prepared drafts of the new VAT Law and the Excise Duty Law, which are supposed to replace the current VAT and Excise Duty law of the 1993. The draft VAT law will soon be submitted to the Parliament. It brings a broader definition of the subject of taxation, implements rules of intra-Community trade and supply of services and other new issues arising from the fact that Poland will become part of EU's internal market. The draft of the new Excise Duty law has already been submitted to the Parliament. It introduces, inter alia, an institution of a "tax warehouse", a place where goods subject to excise duty are produced, processed, held, received or dispatched by a warehouse keeper authorized by the tax authorities. It also introduces a "suspension arrangement", which suspends chargeability of excise duty when goods are produced, processed or held in a tax warehouse or moved between tax warehouses. For information please contact Lejb Fogelman or Jarosław Grzesiak at Dewey Ballantine Grzesiak Limited Partnership. ul. Książęca 4, 00-498 Warsaw. Tel +48 22 690 6100; fax +48 22 690 6222; www.deweyballantine.com