Requesting a waiver of late penalties or interest from the tax authorities restarts the three-year limitation period. Indeed, for the Court of Cassation, this request indicates that the taxpayer acknowledges his debt.
Requesting a remission of penalties or late payment interest from the tax authorities constitutes recognition of the tax debt, which may be express or tacit, judged the Court of Cassation in a judgment of April 21, 2022. Therefore, it relaunches a new three-year deadline for the administration to act.
To decide thus, the judges observe that, according to the law, the tax prescription is interrupted in particular by the notification of a proposal for rectification, that is to say of a reassessment, and by any act involving recognition on the part of the taxpayers. And when the taxpayer discusses the penalties or late payment interest, it is because he tacitly admits his debt, they deduced.
A relaunch three years later
After years of discussion, a taxpayer who had suffered an adjustment on inheritance tax had asked by letter to the tax services to be relieved of the penalties. After being informed of the rejection of his request, he received a new collection notice almost three years later.
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This notice is late because it was issued more than three years after the previous one and the prescription was therefore acquired, he pleaded. But the Court of Cassation found him wrong. By submitting his request for remission without contesting the adjustment, he tacitly acknowledged his debt and therefore himself relaunched a new three-year period.