"Polski Ład" and PIT-2 declaration

With the entry into force on 1 January 2022 of a group of legal regulations, mainly tax regulations, known as "Polski Ład", many doubts arose regarding employees who did not submit PIT-2 declarations to their employers.

Pursuant to Art. 32 sec. 3 of the PIT Act, an employee may submit a declaration to the employer for the purpose of calculating monthly advances for personal income tax, i.e. the PIT-2 form.

In this declaration, the employee states that:

1) does not receive an old-age or disability pension through the tax payer;

2) does not receive income from membership in an agricultural production cooperative or other cooperative engaged in agricultural production;

3) does not reach the income from which it is obliged to pay advances pursuant to art. 44 sec. 3 of the PIT Act (e.g. business activity);

4) does not receive cash benefits paid from the Labor Fund or the Guaranteed Employee Benefits Fund.

The submission of this declaration by the employee to the employer is the employee's right, not his obligation. Pursuant to Art. 32 sec. 3 of the PIT Act, the declaration is submitted before the first payment of remuneration, and pursuant to art. 32 sec. 3a of the PIT Act, the declaration does not have to be repeated in subsequent years if the facts have not changed. A declaration not submitted before the first remuneration payment may be made with effect from the first remuneration payment in the following year.

An employer who received a declaration from an employee on time is obliged to reduce the calculated advance payment for the income tax of a given employee by 1/12 of the tax-reducing amount specified in the first tax scale (i.e. currently 1/12 x17% x PLN 30,000 = PLN 425).

The current turmoil related to PIT-2 declarations results from the fact that in previous years the amount reducing the tax was lower, calculated degressively, for many taxpayers it amounted to about PLN 45 per month, hence many employees abandoned the submission of the PIT-2 declaration and settled the amount reducing the tax on the annual tax settlement.

Settlement of the amount reducing the tax in the annual settlement is still possible in relation to the tax for 2022, however, it seems advisable to draw the attention of the employees of a given entrepreneur to the regulations related to the PIT-2 declaration, because the current settlement of the amount reducing the tax may be more favourable for them.

Update from 11.01.2022

In order to improve the situation of taxpayers who did not submit the PIT-2 form before the first payment of remuneration in 2022, the Regulation of the Minister of Finance of January 7, 2022 on the extension of the deadlines for collection and transfer of advance payments for personal income tax by some payers was issued. in the Journal of Laws on January 7, 2022, and entered into force on January 8, 2022. The adopted solution, however, raises numerous doubts regarding i.e. activities of the minister in the scope of statutory authorization and in the scope of compliance of the regulation with the Constitution of the Republic of Poland.