Individual bank account number for tax payments in Poland since 2020

As with the beginning of 2020 the planned amendment to the Tax Ordinance Act in Poland came into effect, each entrepreneur got his/her own tax bank account and bank account number.

All payments to the tax office have to be made to the account number received, without specifying a tax. The bank account number will be created based on the taxpayer’s NIP or if there is none, based on the PESEL number.

What will actually change?

The new changes mean that both, the entrepreneur running the company and e.g. an employee paying only income tax, have their own account. Thanks to this, it is much easier to verify account numbers – the last digits will coincide with one of the identification numbers.

Individual accounts is not the only simplification in the scope of settling tax liabilities, but there will also be new rules for payments recognition. If the taxpayer has no tax arrears and describes what the transfer is about, the tax office counts the payment in accordance with the instruction.

However, if the entrepreneur has arrears, the payment will be included in the tax arrears first, even if the description of the transfer indicates its other purpose. If arrears arose from different titles, payments will be counted first to those arisen at the earliest.

In a situation where the entrepreneur has no arrears but does not indicate a specific purpose in the transfer, the tax authorities will count the payment on the tax liability with the oldest payment date.

Payments made to an individual tax account are to be counted in turn as follows:

Earliest tax arrears – even if the transfer title indicates a different purpose,

Earliest tax liability – if there are no arrears and the transfer title has not been clearly indicated,

Indicated tax liability – if the taxpayer has no arrears and has specified the purpose of the transfer in detail.

Importantly, after receiving an individual tax account, its use will be mandatory! The use of previous accounts assigned to a given tax office will be incorrect.

How to get the new bank account number?

While some seller might have already received the relevant information about their new bank account, in case you don’t have this new bank account number but you would need it,

1. visit https://www.podatki.gov.pl/generator-mikrorachunku-podatkowego/
2. click the NIP field
3. enter your Polish VAT number (without the “PL” at the beginning)
4. and press the “Generuj” button

Thanks to Wojciech Kurek