Summary

In November 2014, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) caused an international financial scandal that came to be known as the Luxembourg Leaks. The ICIJ published secret tax agreements that concerned more than 300 international companies based in Luxembourg. Just after the Luxembourg Leaks scandal, the monitoring of state aid by the European Commission gained ground. The wheels of examination were set in motion regarding the preliminary rulings of tax authorities. Therefore, it may seem at first that since the Taxation Act (TA) does not establish discretionary powers for the Estonian tax authority in making or not making binding preliminary rulings, and the tax authority must interpret the law in a similar manner in the settlement of all similar situations, the issue of state aid does not concern the everyday activities of our tax authority and thus, longer discussion of this topic is not justified.

It still needs to be noted, however, that the focus of the above-mentioned scandal was on discretionary powers of tax authorities in creating more favourable taxation conditions for undertakings. Therefore, in the context of harmonisation of state aid rules on the European Union level, we also need to view the other rights of the Estonian tax authority in giving advantages to taxable persons, and the article addresses just that. It seeks to answer whether the measures of a tax authority, e.g. not determining, not recovering, and not compulsorily enforcing the rate of taxation, deferring the payment of a tax obligation, or writing off a tax debt may qualify as state aid.