Trends in registration of business in Russia in 2018

2018 has passed; it was full of events and changes in legislation. We would like to share the main trends in registration of business in Russia in 2018 with you.

1. Federal Tax Service (hereinafter the “FTS”) continued its campaign on introducing records on non-reliable data about business into the Unified State Register of Legal Entities (hereinafter “USRLE”), even in respect of the compliant businesses. The main reasons are as follows:

• registered and factual offices are different;
• the office number is not detailed in the address of business in USRLE;
• business may not receive correspondence at its registered office.

Said record can lead to significant risks for business (up to its liquidation), its shareholders and managing bodies.

2. Interviews of the general director of business in the course of incorporation, re-location or reorganization became a common practice of FTS in 2018. The purpose of such interviews is identifying grey companies and making obstacles for them to avoid payment of taxes and debts. Compliant business has nothing to fear, but it is still recommended to be prepared for said interviews.

3. FTS should issue documents confirming registration in electronic form only, starting from April 2018. In practice, this does not work yet and FTS continues to issue paper documents, however this may change any moment.

4. New electronic tool of FTS (https://service.nalog.ru/regmon/) was launched in October 2018. It allows to get notifications, once a certain company files documents for registration, of any changes. This may be very useful for monitoring the status of parties to judicial process, or debtors of business.

Numerous changes could have occurred in your business in 2018. We would like to take this opportunity and remind about importance of their timely registration. ALRUD team would be pleased to assist you with this if required.

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Practices: Corporate and M&A

Note: Please be aware that all information provided in this letter was taken from open sources. Neither ALRUD Law Firm, nor the author of this letter bear any liability for consequences of any decisions made in reliance upon this information.