New rules for working with the self-employed

The Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of the Russian Federation has tightened the procedure for working with self-employed citizens who pay professional income tax. Now employers can be summoned to interdepartmental commissions in the fight against illegal employment.

On March 1, 2024, new rules came into force when working with self-employed citizens who pay professional income tax, which imply:

Creation of commissions on illegal employment in Russia.
Creation of a register of employers who have come under suspicion of carrying out activities related to illegal employment of the population. It is assumed that the registry will be publicly available.
Conducting inspections of Russian companies according to the criteria of illegal employment of citizens.

The main task of the commissions is to collect information about cases of illegal employment, which will show:

the justification and expediency of concluding a contract with the self-employed
the presence or absence of signs of an employment relationship with the self-employed (for example, signs of an employment contract, salary payments, etc.)
the presence or absence of the fact of companies' evasion from paying payroll taxes and insurance premiums
the presence or absence of the fact of substitution of employment contracts by the conclusion of contracts of a civil nature.

The commissions will include representatives of several regulatory agencies: the Social Fund of Russia, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Federal Tax Service, the Federal Labor and Employment Service, trade unions and regional authorities. The members of the commissions during the inspections will be given the following powers:

request for information on payroll and remuneration under civil contracts;
checking payments to the self-employed;
conducting an inspection of workplaces;
sending information to law enforcement agencies for taking action.

If violations are detected, the company will be called to an interdepartmental commission. The basis for this will be one of the listed criteria:

cooperation with more than 10 self-employed people with an average monthly income from the organization of more than 20,000 rubles and an average work duration of more than 3 months;
deviation of the average monthly wage of more than 35% from the average monthly wage in the subject of the Russian Federation for the main type of activity;
the monthly salary is lower than the minimum wage for at least 10 individuals and the proportion of such persons exceeds 10% of the total number of employees.

If the fact of illegal employment is proven, the employer will be entered into a special register, which will be maintained by the Federal Service for Labor and Employment. The registry will start working on January 1, 2025.

We remind you that an individual who is self-employed is recognized as:

does not stand on tax records as an individual entrepreneur and provides services, sells goods of its own production, rents housing to both ordinary individuals and organizations, entrepreneurs (paragraph 6 of Article 2, paragraph 1 of Article 6 of Federal Law No. 422);
is an individual entrepreneur who is subject to professional income tax without applying other special regimes (Simplified taxation system, Unified Imputed Income Tax);
engaged in private practice, for example, lawyers, notaries, arbitration managers, appraisers, mediators and other persons.

If you have the status of "self-employed", an individual is exempt from paying personal income tax, value added tax and insurance premiums. Instead, they need to pay tax at the rates:

4% of the income from the sale of physical persons
6% of the income from the sale of legal entities.

The obligation to pay personal Income Tax and insurance premiums from the income of the self-employed will be imposed on the company if the income of the self-employed (who is not an individual entrepreneur) in the current year exceeded 2.4 million rubles (≈ 200 thousand rubles per month), that is, the individual has lost the right to apply the tax on professional income.

For violation of legal requirements when working with the self-employed, liability is provided for on the grounds presented below.

Basis	Responsibility
Dismissal of an employee and his registration under a civil law contract as self-employed (clause 4 of art.5.27 Administrative Code of the Russian Federation)	Punishment in the form of a fine: • For officials – in the amount of 10-20 thousand rubles; in case of repeated violation – disqualification for a period of 1 to 3 years; • For legal entities – in the amount of 50 – 100 thousand rubles; in case of repeated violation – 100 – 200 thousand rubles
Identification by the tax authority of the signs of an employment contract in a civil contract	• Fines in the amount of (clause 4 of Article 75 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation) - 1/300 of the refinancing rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation for late payment of tax for up to 30 calendar days; - 1/150 of the refinancing rate of the central bank of the Russian Federation, starting from the 31st day of delay. • A fine in the amount of (art. 122,123 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation) - 20% of the unpaid tax amount (if the offense was not committed intentionally); - 40% of the unpaid tax amount (if the offense is intentional)

Basis

Responsibility

Dismissal of an employee and his registration under a civil law contract as self-employed (clause 4 of art.5.27 Administrative Code of the Russian Federation)

Punishment in the form of a fine: • For officials – in the amount of 10-20 thousand rubles; in case of repeated violation – disqualification for a period of 1 to 3 years; • For legal entities – in the amount of 50 – 100 thousand rubles; in case of repeated violation – 100 – 200 thousand rubles

Identification by the tax authority of the signs of an employment contract in a civil contract

• Fines in the amount of (clause 4 of Article 75 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation) - 1/300 of the refinancing rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation for late payment of tax for up to 30 calendar days; - 1/150 of the refinancing rate of the central bank of the Russian Federation, starting from the 31st day of delay. • A fine in the amount of (art. 122,123 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation) - 20% of the unpaid tax amount (if the offense was not committed intentionally); - 40% of the unpaid tax amount (if the offense is intentional)

For questions about working with self-employed citizens, please contact Acsour specialists.

Request