This is to let you know of a tax ruling issued by Director of National Revenue Information (“Authority”) on 17 April 2025 (ref. 0114-KDIP2-2.4010.96.2025.1.RK).

In the ruling, the Authority agreed with the applicant that certain services provided by the Polish branch of an Italian company belonging to an international banking group may be treated as low value-adding services pursuant to Article 11f(2) of the Corporate Income Tax Act (“CITA”).

The branch provides the following services:

  • customer life cycle management, including customer data management, account opening and closing, handling after-sale requests and deposit-related documents;
  • customer authentication to prevent money laundering, terrorist financing and financial fraud, identification of high-risk relationships;
  • accounting and reconciliation services, such as loan amortisation management, reporting, volume analysis;
  • corporate and consumer loan management, including initiation and management of loan applications;
  • payment management, including bank transfers, regulatory reporting and funds transfer control.

Obtaining confirmation through a private tax ruling that certain services are low value-adding services increases the comfort of using the safe harbour provisions in Article 11f CITA (or Article 23r of the Personal Income Tax Act, “PITA”). This allows taxpayers to mitigate their transfer pricing risks as they do not have to hold comparability analyses while enjoying the TP documentation exemption under Article 11n(10) CITA (or Article 23z(10) PITA).

As a reminder, one of the requirements for use of safe harbour provisions is that you must use the cost plus 5% method and hold documents in support of your service fee calculation. As a rule, the services must be provided exclusively to related parties and may not be resold. In addition, neither the provider nor the recipient may be resident in a tax haven.

A tax ruling with assured low value-adding services classification may be an interesting option reducing the TP risk and the related documentation obligations for shared services centres in Poland. This is especially the case where an SSC’s services, even though routine and recurrent, are related to the core business of the group and are difficult to classify pursuant to the annex to the relevant law.

If this issue pertains to your business, please contact us.

This blog post is provided for general information purposes to keep you up-to-date with changes in tax law, tax rulings by authorities, case law of courts and interesting commentaries. Doradztwo Podatkowe WTS&SAJA shall not be held legally liable for any acts or omissions resulting from reliance on such information.