The Federal Tax Service “Transparent Business” service began working in test mode

Current information summary

The main advantage of the Transparent Business service is that it accumulates data for each legal entity - a tax payer. Moreover, we are also talking about information that has now become open to public viewing, since, based on the provisions of Article 102 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation, it has ceased to have the status of a tax secret.

For more information, see “Starting July 25, 2020, the Federal Tax Service has been making more information about counterparties publicly available.”

Thus, the new electronic service “Transparent Business” of the Federal Tax Service allows you to gain comprehensive knowledge about almost any company - current or potential counterparties. Moreover, all information is available without registration or any other additional identification of the user.

Also see “Electronic services for accountants on the Federal Tax Service website: use wisely.”

Using the Transparent Business service allows you to reduce risks when choosing counterparties.

Transparent business: The Federal Tax Service has updated the service for checking counterparties

Users have access to the following information:

• average number of employees in the company;
• taxes paid;
• amounts of arrears and debts for penalties and fines;
• tax offenses committed by the taxpayer;
• amounts of income and expenses and other information specified in Art. 102 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation.

The Transparent Business service provides information about organizations and individual entrepreneurs that come from the Unified State Register of Individual Entrepreneurs and the SME Register.

It has also become possible to receive information about the fact of submitting documents for state registration of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs.

Another new option is a tax burden calculator, which allows taxpayers to estimate their burden taking into account the chosen scale of activity.

How does the Transparent Business service work?

Currently, when you enter information about the TIN, OGRN or company name into the search section, you can find out the following information:

• from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and Unified State Register of Individual Entrepreneurs with the possibility of obtaining an extract from the register;
• from the Register of Disqualified Persons;
• from the SME register with the ability to obtain information;
• from the State Register of accredited branches, representative offices of foreign legal entities with the possibility of obtaining an extract from the register;
• from the Unified State Register of Taxpayers about foreign organizations with the possibility of obtaining information from the register;
• on multiple participation of an individual in organizations;
• about mass registration addresses;
• about legal entities and individual entrepreneurs in respect of which documents for state registration have been submitted;
• on the publication of messages in the journal “Bulletin of State Registration”;
• on special tax regimes applied by organizations;
• on the participation of organizations in a consolidated group of taxpayers;
• on the average number of employees of the organization;
• on the amounts paid by the organization in the calendar year of taxes (fees) and insurance premiums (excluding the amounts of taxes (fees) paid in connection with the importation of goods into the customs territory of the Eurasian Economic Union, the amounts of taxes paid by the tax agent);
• on the amounts of income and expenses according to the accounting (financial) statements of the organization;
• on the amounts of arrears and debts on penalties and fines (for each tax and fee, insurance premium) of organizations;
• on tax offenses of organizations indicating the total amount of the fine;
• about legal entities that have not submitted tax reports for more than a year;
• about legal entities with tax arrears exceeding 1,000 rubles, which were sent to the bailiff for collection.

The Transparent Business service pulls information from various registers: Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Register of Disqualified Persons, Register of SMEs, State Register of Accredited Branches, Representative Offices of Foreign Legal Entities, Unified State Register of Taxpayers on Foreign Organizations.

If a triangle sign appears in some section of a company card, this means that you need to pay special attention to this section. The electronic resource allows every business owner to get an objective picture of what his own business looks like in the eyes of his counterparty.

Previously, the Federal Tax Service warned on its official website that the placement of open data in the Transparent Business service is carried out in accordance with the requirements of Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation of July 10, 2013 No. 583.

For more information about what information you need to check about a business partner, read the article “Protect yourself: how to check your counterparty.”

Where to begin

The official link to the “Transparent Business” of the Federal Tax Service is the same for users from anywhere in the world and has the following address:

The interface of the service in question is quite simple and understandable. The search field is located right on the main page. To find a company you are interested in, simply enter it:

• TIN;
• OGRN;
• company name.

However, using these three criteria, it is not always easy to find a particular legal entity. Thus, the exact TIN and/or OGRN may be unknown. And there are quite a lot of companies with the same names. What should I do? You need to use advanced search.

Advanced search allows you to find the desired company based on parameters that can be set using a set of filters provided by this mode (see the figure below).

How the tax office responds to the claims of entrepreneurs

The transparency of business has turned into illusoryness. The website on which the Federal Tax Service was supposed to publish data on the number of company employees is still not fully operational. And in the information that did end up on the Internet, there are very strange errors. Ivan Yakunin found out what is happening and how the tax authorities respond to business claims.

No miracle happened. The site, which some were afraid of and others were waiting for as a way to expose shell companies, is still there. In a conversation with Kommersant FM, the head of the Department of Registration and Accounting of Taxpayers of the Federal Tax Service, Vitaly Kolesnikov, explained that in fact no one promised that everything would work right away: “We had to post a set of open data in accordance with Article 102 of the Tax Code - we they did it. The Federal Tax Service of Russia, in principle, is considering the possibility of creating a service in which this data can be obtained from search engines, but for now we are not implementing this service. We are working on it, we already have many versions of this resource, but we are not ready to launch it yet.”

Russian business has not yet appreciated transparency

As a result, the data is three huge archives of documents. But unlike the site, which seemed to be quite convenient, understanding these files is extremely difficult. The companies are not even organized there. And those who understood the documents reported incidents. Among the legal entities there was a certain company Gorilla Smart - it creates databases. Please note, it has 638 thousand employees - this is more than Gazprom and Lukoil combined. Kommersant FM contacted its general director Rishat Zakirov, and he said in correspondence: this is a mistake, and the company itself has not been working for a long time. But the tax office also found an explanation for this. Vitaly Kolesnikov noted that the mistake was most likely made in the

However, the published information provided food for thought. For example, it turned out that in Russia 400 thousand companies—that’s 10% of all legal entities—have no staff at all. And a million companies have only one employee, and this is not an individual entrepreneur. It would seem that they are dummies, ephemeral. But the chairman of the public organization Business Solidarity, Yana Yakovleva, thinks differently: “Maybe these are just companies that were once fly-by-night companies that were created for some one-time deals. In Russia, it is a huge problem to close a company. Even if you, let’s say, are a crystal clear person, started your own business, something didn’t work out for you, and you decided that you won’t do it, people just leave their companies, and they still hang in these registers.”

How the tax service monitors transfers between cards

The publication of this information does not imply any liability for the companies. If they have few employees, they will not be subject to an audit: just any partner should be able to see how reliable their counterparty is. But not all entrepreneurs appreciated such a gift. The general director of the company 3D LEAGUE, Gleb Uskov, for example, said that he would not use the resource: “On the one hand, this probably affects ephemeral people, on the other hand, it affects everyone else. In theory, this is shifting the function of state control to those persons who have nothing to do with it. Moreover, this load is inadequate for many: that is, if someone does business with a large number of small counterparties, how can you check 100 small counterparties?”

So far, instead of a formidable weapon or assistant in the fight against fly-by-night scams, the project is a chaotic pile of data. Although now the main thing is not the information itself, but convenient access to it. Surely everything will be fixed sooner or later - you never know how many large services have been launched with misfires. But there is a question: does the market need it with so much erroneous information and long-forgotten companies?

From October 1, the Federal Tax Service website will also begin to publish data on the income and expenses of companies and indicate whether they have tax arrears. In December the amount of arrears will appear.

Comparison of companies

It is important that using the Transparent Business resource you can obtain comparative statistics about companies based on specified criteria.

To switch to this mode, you need to select several organizations of interest, then use the “Filter” icon on the company card and in the “Select for Comparison” section that appears, click the “Compare” button.

Also see “What the Federal Tax Service publishes in the Transparent Business service.”

about the project

This service is designed to simplify the work of entrepreneurs. Businessmen receive information about partners and competitors, analyze their position in the market. Based on these data, conclusions are drawn and plans for the development of activities are drawn up.

Checking counterparties using the “Transparent (White) Business” system gives positive results and takes entrepreneurs to a new level of development.

Startup problems

A bill to create a new tax reporting system was announced at the beginning of winter 2020. They allocated six months for the development and launch of the service, and already in mid-summer 2020 they planned to please entrepreneurs.

But the work was delayed for the following reasons:

• shortage of personnel - programmers in government agencies. The number of IT specialists is decreasing, as personnel strive to earn more and go to companies abroad. To avoid leakage, the state is developing projects to encourage IT specialists;
• underfunding. Several million rubles were allocated for the “Transparent Business” service for tax authorities (Federal Tax Service), but in fact this amount turned out to be not enough. To receive a new tranche, they waited until the budget for the next year was approved;
• lack of data on taxpayers. When they began to check registered entrepreneurs, it was discovered that 25% of them did not provide information about their activities for an average of 2-4 quarters;
• presence of errors and inaccurate information. The human factor played a role here. The tax service also lacks personnel. Employees are overworked. The introduction of mass information and its poor verification leads to shortcomings.

Errors were corrected as they were received. The electronic service – resource “Transparent Business” first started working in test mode.

This pointed to additional gaps in the work. After improvements, the system became available to everyone.

Goals

The main task of creating a resource is to organize trusting relationships between entrepreneurs of different groups and areas of activity.
Businessmen learn as much information as possible about their counterparties in an accessible manner before concluding a deal. In essence, this is protection against drawing up contracts with negative consequences. We recommend you study! Follow the link:

Advantages and disadvantages of individual entrepreneurs

The “white” resource of the Federal Tax Service or “Transparent Business” gives access to the following information:

• full and abbreviated name of the organization, individual entrepreneur, company. As well as the legal address, full name of the owner, contact details, registration date;
• the amount of taxes and fees paid for a specific period. Additionally, information is provided on debt related to work with the Federal Tax Service;
• financial statements. Information about the income and expenses of enterprises, individual entrepreneurs, etc. is made available to the public;
• information about regular work. Information is recorded on the number of hired and dismissed employees for the previous year;
• information about the use of the service. Not all enterprises and organizations are included in the database yet. But the service is constantly updated. Companies are not asked for permission to disclose information.

The focus is on arrears of payments to the tax service, pension fund and social insurance fund. Entrepreneurs and all citizens of the country have access to the materials.

The Federal Tax Service has disclosed business tax information in a hard-to-read open data format

Photo: iStock
The Federal Tax Service (FTS) has published data on tax and accounting reports of Russian businesses, according to a message from the FTS press service. However, it will be difficult for entrepreneurs to take advantage of this information, experts say.

Tax officials posted information on the average number of employees of legal entities, special tax regimes applied by companies, as well as on the participation of organizations in the consolidated group of taxpayers as of December 31 last year. “Publishing this information will help taxpayers choose reliable partners for successful activities,” says the Federal Tax Service website.

The information is posted in open data format on the department’s website (sets 74–76). Entrepreneurs are offered to download archives with files in .xml format (at the time of publication, the total number of downloads was 84). The Federal Tax Service did not leave guidelines for using archives, and it was not possible to display xml files correctly using the Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome browsers, oh.

Screenshot of the Federal Tax Service website

According to the head of the tax dispute practice at MEF-Audit PKF, Alexander Ovesnov, it is impossible for a non-specialist to work with sets of electronic records, writes RBC. The head of the analytical department of Pepeliaev Group, Vadim Zaripov, agreed with him. According to him, the open data format makes it difficult to use the information. Ovesnov suggested that taxpayers expected to see information in the form of a convenient and accessible electronic service (for example, in the form of “Information on state registration of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs” or similar services on the Federal Tax Service website).

At the end of July, the RIA Novosti agency, with reference to the Federal Tax Service, reported that from August 1, information about taxpayers, which was previously classified as a tax secret, will appear on the Transparent Business portal (from the beginning of August, the Federal Tax Service planned to post data on the average number of employees for the previous year , special tax regimes and statistics on business participation in a consolidated group of taxpayers).

A message from the Federal Tax Service for the Kaluga Region dated April 19, 2020 talks about the “Transparent Business” service, which will allow you to check counterparties. Let us note that at that time the Federal Tax Service announced that sets of open data about organizations would appear on the agency’s website.

Screenshot of the Federal Tax Service website

The press service of the central office of the Federal Tax Service of Russia Inc. reported that the portal was “never intended” as part of the publication of tax data. A separate portal could work if the posted open data is in demand, a representative of the Federal Tax Service suggested. “It was understood that from the 1st (August - Inc.) there will be open data,” added the department representative. According to him, the Federal Tax Service fulfills its obligation to open data.

The representative of the department noted that the placement of data in a published format is provided for by law. “We are obliged to post it in this format, and people who are interested in it read this data without software, or use programs that can be found,” said a representative of the department. He noted that entrepreneurs can find an organization using its TIN in open data.

In June, tax officials postponed the launch of the Transparent Business service to August 1. This happened due to a large number of requests from entrepreneurs. The business asked the Federal Tax Service for time to verify the data.

It is planned that from October 1, the tax service will disclose data on financial statements, the amount of taxes paid, insurance premiums and other fees. And from December 1, the Federal Tax Service’s file cabinet should contain data on companies that underpay or do not pay taxes at all and commit other tax offenses.

The Federal Tax Service wanted to start publishing data on taxpayers back in July 2020. However, the publication of this information was postponed because entrepreneurs wanted to verify information about themselves.

Subscribe to our channel on Telegram: @incnews