The law was adopted pursuant to the resolution of the Constitutional Court dated November 25, 2025 No. 41-P. The Constitutional Court found unconstitutional the practice in which the seller automatically increased the contract price by the amount of VAT after he had an obligation to pay this tax. The customers who were deprived of the right to deduction incurred uncompensated expenses. Law No. 293-FZ of 08/04/2026 amended Article 166 of the Tax Code and amended Article 168 of the Tax Code.
The new paragraph 3.2 of Article 166 of the Tax Code establishes four conditions, upon simultaneous fulfillment of which the seller calculates VAT using the calculation method and pays it independently. First, the obligation to pay VAT arose precisely because of changes in tax legislation after the conclusion of the contract. Secondly, the buyer does not have the right to deduct the input VAT. Third, the parties did not review the contract price due to the transfer of the seller to pay VAT. Fourth, the contract does not contain conditions for the mandatory signing of an additional agreement on price increases during such a transition.
The estimated rates applied by the seller are 5/105, 7/107, 10/110 or 22/122, depending on the applicable VAT rate. The invoice is not issued to the buyer; the seller makes one copy for himself. Paragraph 1 of Article 168 of the Tax Code retains the general rule of presenting VAT to the buyer in excess of the price, however, it explicitly excludes cases falling under paragraph 3.2 of Article 166 of the Tax Code.
A practical example: In August 2025, Storm LLC signed a long—term supply agreement with Tornado LLC, a VAT defaulter. The cost of the batch, which is scheduled for delivery in November 2026, is 300,000 rubles. On November 1, 2026, Storm became a VAT payer at a rate of 22% after exceeding the income limit of 20 million rubles. Since all four conditions of clause 3.2 are met, the seller calculates VAT using the calculation method: 300,000 × 22/122 = 54,098.36 rubles — and pays it to the budget independently.
The new rules do not apply in three cases. The first is a legislative increase in the VAT rate without incurring a new obligation to pay tax: for example, the transition from the 10% rate to 22% or from the reduced 5% rate to 7% for simplified tax authorities. Secondly, the parties agreed to increase the price and signed an additional agreement. The third option is that the buyer has the right to deduct the input VAT at the time of shipment. In all these situations, VAT is charged in excess of the price and presented to the buyer with an invoice in the usual manner.
A separate case: if the seller has lost the VAT exemption due to exceeding the income limit, and not because of amendments to the Tax Code, this qualifies as a change in the conditions of his economic activity — the new rules do not apply. Similarly, if the buyer has the right to deduct after shipment, it is not necessary to recalculate the tax calculated by the calculation method on the date of shipment.
For companies operating under long-term contracts with foreign counterparties from the BRICS countries, where the buyer is often not a Russian VAT payer, the amendments mean the need to review existing contracts: check whether or not there are conditions for reviewing the price when the seller's tax status changes and, if necessary, fix the agreements in additional agreements by October 1, 2026.
