Taxpayers’ Rights and Tax Audits
the Right to be Heard and to Access Documents under European Union Law
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.46801/2595-7155-rdtia-n10-5Keywords:
European Union, fundamental rights, tax audits, right to be heard, right to access documents, restrictionsAbstract
This essay deals with the question of which rights should be effectively ensured to taxpayers during tax audits, i.e., before any infraction notice is issued, with particular focus on the right to be heard and the right to access documents under the EU Law. An overview of the CJEU case law demonstrates that the taxpayers are not always granted with them. To address this question, two hypotheses are proposed: (i) the restrictions on such rights are often based on the premise that they should be ensured only after the issuance of an infraction notice; and (ii) nevertheless, this premise is not only artificial, but also insufficient to ensure an effective protection of taxpayers’ rights. To demonstrate them, this essay develops both a descriptive analyses of the state of art of the CJEU case law, and a normative analysis of why, how and when the right to be heard and to access documents must be ensured to taxpayers in the context of tax audits.
References
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Decisões citadas
CJEU, 7 de maio de 2017, Processo C-617/10, Åkerberg Fransson, EU:C:2013:280.
CJEU, 16 de maio de 2017, Processo C-682/15, Berlioz, EU:C:2017:373.
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CJEU, 21 de novembro de 1991, Processo C-269/90, Technische Universität München, UE:C:1991:438.
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CJEU, 17 de dezembro de 2015, Processo C-419/14, WebMindLicenses, EU:C:2015:832.
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