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Excise taxes play a fundamental role in Puerto Rico's fiscal policy, impacting both individuals and businesses across various sectors. Understanding the complexities of these taxes, along with available exemptions and strategic management approaches, is essential for maintaining compliance and optimizing financial strategies. Excise taxes in Puerto Rico are specific taxes imposed on the sale, use, consumption, importation, or manufacture of certain goods. They are different from income taxes and sales and use taxes, focusing on targeted items. These items are detailed in Sections 3020.01 through 3020.12 of Subtitle C, Chapter 2. of the Puerto Rico Internal Revenue Code of 2011, as amended, (“PR Tax Code”). All sections cited below are in relation to the PR Tax Code.

On May 11, 2021, the Puerto Rico Treasury Department issued Administrative Determination No. 21-05 and determined that, for taxable years that begin after December 31, 2018, taxpayers will be able to deduct 100% of the expenses incurred or paid to stockholders, related persons or entities not engaged in trade or business in Puerto Rico, as long as the expenses are based on a Transfer Pricing Study that has been issued and is available at the time of filing the tax return. This article will provide you with an explanation of what exactly is transfer pricing, and how a Transfer Pricing Study may benefit your business.

It’s been almost two years since Act 52-2022 introduced a noteworthy change to Puerto Rico's income tax regime by adopting the Disregarded Entity (DE) treatment. This change aligns Puerto Rico’s taxation treatment of single-member entities with the one established by the U.S. federal tax code for DE. Its purpose is to foster local parity for owners who have elected this option for their entities in the U.S. One key aspect to consider is that certain local rules for DEs may differ from the ones established in the U.S.

If you are looking for alternatives to expand your current operations or investment opportunities, now is the time to bring Puerto Rico at the front and center. The benefits of establishing, relocating or expanding businesses in Puerto Rico are, without a doubt, attractive and rarely surpassed by any other jurisdiction.

On October 31, 2016, the Department of the Treasury launched the Unified Internal Revenue System, better known as SURI. Since then, there have been multiple updates and improvements to SURI, all in efforts to integrate and streamline tax and revenue administration to drop the complexity of having multiple systems for the benefit of the Treasury and the taxpayer. Each year it is more common for the processing time of electronically filed returns to decrease significantly, in some cases, it can take less than a week. Therefore, notices are received quickly easing a Tax Audit for the Treasury. We believe that an effective way to start and/or prepare for the 2024 tax season is to know the implications of an audit and how to be prepared for it. It is important to know the requirements that the law demands of taxpayers to follow the provisions of the Puerto Rico Internal Revenue Code of 2011. Although there are other types of audits in Puerto Rico, that are performed by the different governmental agencies in the Island, this article will cover tax audits by the Puerto Rico Treasury Department.

Act 52 of June 30, 2022 (“Act 52”) modified several Sales and Use Tax (“SUT”) sections of the Puerto Rico Internal Revenue Code of 2011, as amended (“the Code”), expanding the scope of the term "marketplace seller" and "marketplace facilitator" to include the sale of “admission rights”. As a result of these amendments, the Puerto Rico Treasury Department (“PRTD”) reviewed the process to be followed by ticket seller companies and promoters to comply with the new rules. This article will guide you on the post-Act 52 requirements and processes that impact these businesses.