The law of 1 March 2019, amending the law of 25 November 2014, providing for the procedure applicable to the exchange of information upon request in tax matters, has been voted on February 14th 2019 by the Luxembourg parliament and published on March 5th 2019 (hereinafter the “2019 Law”).
The 2019 Law is the direct consequence of the so-called ECJ Berlioz case rendered on May 16th 2017 by the European Court of Justice (please refer to our BSP legal alert dated June 16th 2017). Unsurprisingly, the 2019 Law remains unchanged from the draft bill (please refer to our BSP Legal alert dated December 28th 2017) and re-establishes a complete judicial remedy for the information holder, i.e. not only the possibility of an appeal against the fine imposed by the tax authorities on non-communication of the information requested, but also an action for annulment against the request for information, if it does not meet the principle of foreseeable relevance. Although, by application of the Berlioz case-law, the Luxembourg administrative courts already granted the possibility of an appeal, the 2019 Law now provides for a clear framework and sets out the applicable procedure and the related deadlines of the appeal. Albeit, solely for the information holder and not for the person ultimately concerned by the request.
Hence, as of March 9th 2019, appeals must now be filed with the lower administrative court (tribunal administratif) within one month of notification of the request to the holder of the requested information.
Share on
