Practices Sectors Private clients

Tax Advice and Disputes

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BGP Litigation Tax Advice and Disputes Practice demonstrates a high standard of professionalism and have plenty of experience in comprehensive protection of businesses against tax claims, pre-trial and judicial settlement of tax disputes, identification and evaluation of tax risks, support of on-site and off-site tax audits, tax planning and structuring.

Lawyers' experience includes work in tax authorities and BIG-4 companies, as well as inhouse work at strategic enterprises. Extensive work experience makes it possible to take a comprehensive approach to solving a wide range of issues and handle problems both from the point of view of a public employee and from the point of view of an in-house lawyer, taking into account good practices of leading international firms, as well as necessary knowledge about operational processes within companies. All these things make it possible to perform high-level analytical procedures targeted at developing tax compliance systems, determining the amounts of taxes subject to refund or offset, and developing recommendations on improving the tax efficiency of businesses. Moreover, the wide specialisation profile of the firm makes it possible to attract experts from various branches of law to comprehensively resolve tax law issues and dive deep in business processes.

The main part of the team has the status of an attorney, which gives additional protection for clients and expands the range of opportunities when interacting with government agencies. The team has the right to conduct attorney examinations and send requests for discovery of documents and information, represent the interests of clients without a power of attorney based on a warrant, counsel witnesses during questioning at tax authorities, and are also required to preserve the attorney-client privilege – all these things allow for maximum efficiency in achieving the set tasks.
Services
Tax advice
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  • Tax structuring:

    • Identification of potential tax and compliance risks of the existing business model, analysis of corresponding mitigation measures

    • Tax structuring of transactions, including contract structuring, elaboration (revision) of contract provisions from the taxation viewpoint, preparation of a defence file to justify existence of a business purpose (no unjustified tax benefit), economic feasibility and documented costs

    • Development of various business structuring options, taking account of the advantages and disadvantages, and potential tax risks from the Russian and international taxation viewpoint

  • Tax audit:

    • Identification of the basic tax risks in company activities, including for preparing for an on-site tax audit

    • Identification of tax amounts overpaid through failure to enjoy tax preferences provided for by law

    • Risk analysis of significant agreements, major transactions, loan and collateral agreements, guarantees and sureties, agreements with affiliates, public contracts

    • Comprehensive financial, legal and tax analysis of the client’s financial and economic activities, as well as publicly available information and information from special resources for risks

  • Tax benefits:

    • Applicability analysis of individual benefits established by the Tax Code of the Russian Federation and/or local laws, and computation of the relevant tax effect

    • Research into the legality of a company’s application for various state support measures, preparation of a comparative analysis and recommendations on use of the best possible measures

    • Assessment of the feasibility of preferential tax treatment of relevant company activities, comparative analysis if there are several potentially applicable treatments, comparison with the feasibility of using additional benefits, tax burden computation

  • Methodological support:

    • Writing or reviewing current accounting policies for tax purposes

    • Preparation of internal documentation, including assessment of tax risks, building a system of internal tax controls, including for the purpose of entering tax monitoring

    • Development of methodologies, policies, instructions, regulations, tax risk matrices, other local documents and building a company control environment for tax purposes


Tax audit support and tax dispute settlement
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  • Reducing risks at the pre-audit analysis stage:

    • Representation of customer interests at a meeting of the commission (task team) at the premises of the tax authority

    • Setting up a body of evidence and collection of defence files to reduce tax risks associated with tax authority claims

    • Preparation of responses to “information letters” from tax authorities containing an inculpatory stance regarding the alleged non-payment of taxes

    • Preparation of justified objections, considering available documents and information

    • Development of a legal reasoning regarding claims of the tax authority voiced during the meeting of the commission (task team)

  • Development of a tax audit passing strategy:

    • Development of a tax risk reduction strategy, including specification of risk reduction measures, as well as the guidance for their implementation

  • Support of tax control activities:

    • Legal assistance in preparing responses to requests from tax authorities for the submission of documents and information

    • Support during questioning at the tax agency, as well as representation during seizure of documents, inspection of premises and examination

    • Representation in matters related to audit passing, submission of documents, questioning procedure, etc.

  • Pre-trial and judicial appeals against tax claims:

    • Analysis of audit materials and development of a tax claim appeal strategy

    • Representation in court

    • Preparation of procedural documents required during the hearing of a case: petitions, written explanations, other documents and materials

    • Preparation of a court appeal against a tax authority decision

    • Preparation of a complaint to a higher tax authority, taking account of the legal reasoning and evidence base built up

    • Building an evidence base, including conducting attorney interviews, sending attorney requests

    • Preparation of written recommendations on building an evidence base (body of evidence) and collection of other documents and materials required for appealing against tax claims

Legislative drafting and GR
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  • A “turnkey” regulatory legal act or individual stages, including:

    • Drafting a regulatory legal act and accompanying documents

    • Expert support for a rule-making initiative

    • Future outlook

  • Examination of regulatory legal acts and drafts thereof

  • Preparation and expert support for requests to public authorities

  • Monitoring of regulatory legal acts

Products

We advised:

A Major Food Delivery Service

on developing a defence strategy during an on-site tax audit, including putting together defence files for challenging additional charges

A Major Russian Bank

on assessing the legality of allowing VAT relief for group members engaged in information technology collaboration

A Car Sharing Company

on tax planning, including analysis of the existing business structure from the taxation viewpoint

A Major Russian Pulp-and-Paper Company

on tax optimisation and planning issues, including analysing the specifics of the business area, current judicial practice on the risks of using certain tax planning methods, as well as opportunities for tax incentive use

A Confidential Client

specialising in leasing of motor vehicles, on tax planning, including analysing the existing company's tax system efficiency

Major Russian Gas Processing Plant

in connection with analysis of a draft agreement for design, supply, construction and services for commissioning of erected facilities (EPC) worth approximately RUB 500 bln to mitigate tax risks associated with its performance

A Leading Russian Generating Company

in connection with analysis of the current company structure from the tax viewpoint and elaborating recommendations for mitigating the identified risks

The World's Biggest Manufacturer of Electronics and Household Appliances

in connection with a comprehensive analysis of its financial and economic activities, and identification of tax risks, including generation of defence files

A Leading Russian Door-to-Door Delivery Company

in connection with preparing a legal opinion on the tax risks of hiring employees under outsourcing and outstaffing agreements

A Holding Company

in connection with potential acquisition of three companies – the only owners of engineering networks and licences for 5G signal transmission in Russia, legal, financial and tax due diligence was performed and tax risks identified to a sum of over RUB 2 bln

A Big Manufacturing Company

during an on-site tax audit on issues of additional profit taxation and VAT charges on services purchased from the parent company, including preparing the requisite evidence and negotiating with the tax authorities

A Major Oilfield Service Company

in a dispute over additional withholding tax, corresponding penalties and fines. For the first time in several years, they managed to prove that a foreign financial and investment company belonging to the group (Cyprus) can be a beneficial owner of income (BOI) in the form of dividends received from a Russian subsidiary. The case changed the stance of FAS Russia and provided grounds for it to issue a clarification letter

A Confidential Client

in connection with preparing a complaint to the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation resulting in numerous negative judicial practices being overcome and a legal strategy developed allowing taxpayers to recoup legal costs of a bank guarantee provided by the taxpayer as a cross-undertaking in damages

Oil and Gas Majors

in tax disputes related to construction, operation and liquidation of various infrastructure facilities, repair, renovation and modernisation of fixed assets, including side-tracking, as well as deduction of the costs of maintaining service facilities and plants

A Subsidiary of a Major Russian Monopoly

in a tax dispute over collection over RUB 800 mln in taxes in connection with illegal, in the tax authority’s view, understatement of sales revenues

Leading International Biopharmaceutical Company

on tax complications of paying bonuses to pharmacy chains for achieving sale or purchase targets, tax risks of compensating distributors for trade marketing campaigns and tax implications of payments to maintain inventory

A Russian Generating Company

in connection with analysis of the company structure from the tax legislation viewpoint. Groups of tax risks totalling more than RUB 1.9 bln were identified, recommendations for minimising them were worked out, protective files and a legal stance generated

A Production Holding Company

in tax control activities and pre-trial appeal against claims totalling more than RUB 250 mln. All significant claims of the tax authority were resigned

Team

Alexander Golikov
Partner, partner committee member, attorney — Tax Advise and Disputes
Pavel Kondukov
Partner, attorney — Tax Advise and Disputes
Denis Savin
Partner, attorney — Tax Advise and Disputes
Valentina Semenova
Counsel, attorney — Tax Advise and Disputes

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