According to Article 16 of Decree 125/2020/ND-CP amending Decree 310/2025/ND-CP (Decree), penalties for false declaration leading to a shortage of tax payable or an increase in tax exemption, reduction, and refund are as follows:
1. Fine 20% of the amount of tax declared in excess or the amount of tax that has been exempted, reduced, or refunded higher than the regulations for one of the following acts:
(i) Incorrectly opening the basis for calculating taxes or the amount of tax deducted or determining the wrong cases of tax exemption, reduction, or refund, leading to a shortage of tax payable or an increase in the amount of tax exempted, reduced, or refunded, but economic transactions have been fully reflected in the accounting system, invoices, and legal documents;
(ii) Incorrect declaration reduces the amount of tax payable or increases the amount of tax refunded, the amount of tax exempted or reduced has been determined by the competent authority to be an act of tax evasion, but the taxpayer has committed the first administrative violation of tax evasion, has declared and paid the full amount of tax to the state budget before the competent authority issues the penalty decision and the tax authority has made a record to determine that the act of declaration is incorrect, leading to tax shortage.
(iii) Incorrect disclosure leads to a shortage of tax payable or an increase in tax exempted, reduced, or refunded for related transactions, but the taxpayer has prepared a dossier to determine market prices or has prepared and sent to the tax authority the appendices according to regulations on tax management for enterprises with related transactions;
(iv) Using illegal invoices and documents to account for the value of purchased goods and services reduces the amount of tax payable or increases the amount of tax refunded, the amount of tax exempted or reduced, but when the tax authority inspects and inspects and discovers that the buyer has proven that the violation of using illegal invoices and documents belongs to the seller and the buyer has fully accounted for it according to regulations.
2. Remedial measures:
- Forced to pay the full amount of underlying tax, the amount of tax refunded, exempted, or reduced higher than prescribed and the late payment of tax to the state budget for the act prescribed in Clause 1.
In case the statute of limitations for penalties has passed, the taxpayer will not be punished according to the provisions of Clause 1, but the taxpayer must pay the full amount of the missing tax, the tax refunded, exempted, or reduced higher than the regulations and the late payment of tax to the state budget within the time limit prescribed in Clause 6, Article 8 of the Decree;
- Forced to adjust the loss and input value-added tax deducted for the next transfer period (if any) for the act specified in Clause 1.
3. In case the taxpayer makes a wrong declaration according to the provisions of Point (i), (iii) Clause 1 but does not lead to a shortage of tax payable, an increase in tax exempted, reduced or has not been refunded, he/she will not be punished according to the provisions but will be punished according to the provisions of Clause 3, Article 12 of the Decree.
