In its judgement of 30 July 2025 (file ref. X R 7/23), the Federal Fiscal Court (BFH) held that the filing deadline for the 2019 tax return that was extended by statute does not have the same effect as an official deadline extension as defined by section 109 of the Fiscal Code (AO). Consequently, if it is filed late, it is compulsory to charge a late-filing penalty under sec-tion 152(2) AO. The Federal Fiscal Court held that the exception under section 152(2) no. 1 AO, which would have allowed a discretionary decision under section 152(1) AO, was ruled out because the conditions were not met. The claimant was not able to derive the possibility of a discretionary decision from the FAQs on “Corona” (taxes), the legal character of which the Federal Fiscal Court also commented on in its judgement.
