2020 Income and Wealth Tax Campaign
The Personal Income Tax and Wealth Tax campaign for 2020 began on 7 April and will continue until 30 June.
The deadline for filing Personal Income Tax (IRPF) and Wealth Tax (IP) is 30 June.
In the event that the tax returns are payable by direct debit, the deadline for filing will end on 25 June. In all other cases, i.e. when the return is to be refunded, with a waiver of the refund or to be paid by direct debit, the filing deadline is 30 June.
As has been the case for many years, tax returns can be paid in two instalments, the first on 30 June, which amounts to 60% of the total amount, coinciding with the end of the income tax campaign, and the second on 5 November for the remaining 40% of the total amount to be paid.
Some of the new features to be highlighted for this income tax campaign are as follows:
1. Consideration of income obtained as a benefit for self-employed workers who cease to be self-employed
The amounts obtained by self-employed workers as severance benefits paid by the collaborating mutual insurance companies will be considered as income from work.
2. Deductible expenses for the determination of the net income derived from income from real estate capital
In accordance with the provisions of article 15 of Royal Decree-Law 35/2020, of 22 December, in 2020 and 2021, the deadline for the amounts owed by tenants to be considered as doubtful debts and deductible from the net income from real estate capital is reduced from six to three months.
3. Personal and family minimum for taxpayers in Catalonia
All those taxpayers who are resident in Catalonia and whose sum of the general and savings taxable income is equal to or less than 12,450.00 euros will be subject to a personal minimum of 6,105.00 euros.
4. Deduction for donations
The scale applicable during the 2020 tax period to the deduction for donations is increased by five percentage points, as follows:
5. Special tax on prizes from certain lotteries and bets
The exempt amount of prizes for the 2020 tax year is 40,000.00 euros.
It is important to remember that the obligation to declare, for taxpayers who obtain income from work, is set at 22,000 euros per year paid by a single payer, which is reduced to 14,000 euros provided that the amount received by the second and subsequent payers exceeds 1,500 euros per year, a fact that the Tax Agency expects to find some 327,000 taxpayers affected by ERTE and who were not obliged, until now, to file the personal income tax return.
In relation to these workers affected by an ERTE, an extraordinary deferral of the tax debt has been approved; in this way, the payment of the quota will be made in six instalments, due on the 20th of each month, with the first instalment due on 20 July 2021. Likewise, no late payment interest will accrue during the aforementioned deferment and no additional guarantee will be required.
The application must comply with the following requirements:
- The applicant, or any of the members of the family unit in the case of joint taxation, must have been included in an ERTE during the year 2020, having received the corresponding benefits in that year.
- The total amount pending payment by the applicant, both in the voluntary period and in the enforcement period, of public law debts managed by the State Tax Administration Agency and by the bodies or agencies of the State Treasury, does not exceed 30,000 euros.
- The personal income tax return must be filed within the voluntary period within the voluntary period for self-assessment and payment, and the payment of complementary self-assessments after 30 June 2021 cannot be paid in instalments.
Finally, it should be noted that the Generalitat de Catalunya has also approved an autonomous deduction that aims to prevent people with low incomes who have been affected by an ERTE from being penalised when declaring their income tax. This deduction consists of applying a deduction in the regional gross tax liability for the amount resulting from subtracting the state gross tax liability from the regional gross tax liability. This deduction will not cover the total amount that the SEPE failed to withhold, but it will cover the surcharge of the regional personal income tax rate if it is higher than the state rate.
The complexity of the declarations -due to the reforms approved in recent years- makes it necessary to speed up the collection of all the data in order to carry out an exhaustive analysis of the casuistry of each declaration.