Overview of the tax law decisions of the Zurich Tax Appeals Court published in August 2021.
- StRG ZH, 7 September 2021, DB.2019.126 / ST.2019.164: One-off effects in the case of a change of accounting method (this decision is not yet legally binding): A self-employed person changed from the ACTUAL method to the SHOULD method in his own accounting. This change led to a one-time increase in income in the tax period of the change of method. This increase in income must be fully taken into account in the rate-determining income. This is because the delayed tax recognition of older invoices due to the choice of the ACTUAL method and the deferral of taxation for services in the respective second half of the year caused by the invoicing rhythm chosen by the taxpayer are equivalent in their effect to the formation of hidden reserves and their tax-effective release (in the present case through the corresponding capitalisations) is only subject to separate and thus progression-breaking taxation within a time-limited framework in the special case of the definitive cessation of business of a self-employed person. Such a cessation of business did not occur. This led to the dismissal of the complaint and appeal.
- StRG ZH, 9 June 2021, DB.2020.218 / ST.2020.254: Support deduction (this decision is legally binding): The assertion of the support deduction requires that the support is provided free of charge. If the support is provided in the form of a loan, this criterion is only met if the lender no longer expects repayment from the beginning or in the tax period in question. A retroactively agreed loan reduction is irrelevant. Accordingly, the complaint and appeal were dismissed.
The decisions of the Zurich Tax Appeals Court are available here .
