I rechecked my taxes since 2020

At the end of May 2026 my bank asked me for a certificate confirming I had no tax arrears. I thought it was a formality. It was not. Instead of the certificate, a formal request came from the tax office, and then another.

For the next thirteen weeks I compared every number with its source myself. In other words, I did what I used to pay an accounting office to do.

Where I started

I opened my business at the end of 2020. From 2021 an accounting office kept my books.

I set one rule: I count a document as filed only if I have proof that it reached the tax office, ZUS (social insurance) or the bank. That means a UPO (the official filing receipt), an entry on my tax account in e-Urząd Skarbowy (the tax office's online portal), a posting at ZUS or a line on a bank statement. A saved XML file on its own proves nothing. I compared the numbers with my own scripts and AI agents, checked every correction on the official form and filed it myself.

At first I thought I had overpaid because some cost invoices never reached the office. The problem was somewhere else.

What I found

2020. This one is my mistake. In December I issued one invoice before the office started handling my affairs, and I did not file an annual return. The tax office reminded me of it only in August 2026. I filed the return with czynny żal (voluntary disclosure).

2021. In CEIDG (the business register) I chose the flat tax and paid flat-tax advance payments all year. The annual return was filed on PIT-36, the form for the tax scale, instead of PIT-36L (the flat-tax form), so the advance payments went into the wrong return. It also omitted my employment income, although the PIT-11 (the employer's annual income statement) was in e-Urząd Skarbowy.

Here too the mistake is mine. When the request came, I first defended the tax scale, filed corrections and paid. Two days later I reread my CEIDG application and understood that I was wrong. I backed down.

2022. Again the PIT-11 income was missing. The official first wanted a flat-tax return, then accepted my explanation that in that year I could choose the scale. In the register that year still carries a "to be clarified" flag.

2023. I checked the advance payments only after another request, in July. The annual settlement assumed that all of them had been paid. In online banking two of them had the status "scheduled".

The money never went out of the account. They were my transfers, but nobody, neither I nor the office, compared them with the tax account. For other advance payments the interest was counted together with the tax.

In the same year, on the office's advice, I registered for VAT-UE (EU VAT registration) because of one sale to a company in the EU. After that the VAT taxpayer register showed me as an active VAT payer, although I was using the exemption, and the taxpayer report demanded JPK files (electronic VAT records). I am clarifying with the tax office where that status came from.

2024. Nothing significant.

2025. For most of the year the business was suspended. From September I became an active VAT payer because I signed a new contract. I filed the JPK_V7M files for the last months of the year myself, and late. In June 2026 I accepted a fine at the tax office.

What this means for the accounting office

I do not want to turn this into a story about a bad accountant. Nobody falsified anything.

When an accounting office takes over a client, good practice is to check the opening position: whether earlier returns were filed, whether there are arrears, whether the advance payments match the tax account. The office can check the VAT status itself in the public VAT taxpayer register. It will see the rest if the client hands over the CEIDG application, the PIT-11 or access to their records in e-Urząd Skarbowy.

My documents show that the office asked for none of this. It did not check 2020 and did not ask about other income. I do not know their work from the inside. In my view this was not bad faith but routine: the same forms every month and numbers copied from one window to another.

I did not check what the office filed in my name either. I paid every month and assumed someone was comparing it with the sources. Nobody was.

Where I stand

I exchanged a dozen or so letters with the tax office and filed more than fifteen returns and corrections. I have a UPO for each one. I got the first certificate of no arrears in June, with a note attached. In July and in August I got certificates without a note.

After one of my corrections, the tax office's system charged interest on an amount I had paid earlier. I wrote an explanation the same day. The office withdrew the charge and apologised.

Why Bookeper looks the way it does

I see two problems here. The first is the risk of human error in routine work. The second is lack of time: when someone runs dozens of identical routines, it is hard to stop at one client and ask "where does this number come from?". This applies to everyone, me included.

That is why Bookeper does the routine and shows the source of every number: the invoice, the transfer, the register entry and the legal provision. When the sources do not match, it shows the discrepancy instead of hiding it. It prepares draft returns. You check, approve and file them.

Software makes mistakes too. Garbage in, garbage out. That is why for every number you see where the software got it, and you can catch an error before a request from the tax office arrives.

If you want to check your own numbers

Add your invoices and bank statements and see where the numbers match and where they do not. Your first accounting month is free, no card needed.