Tax reform
Old credit has an expiry date
The recovery window moves on its own — and always in the same direction.
Start with the size of the ground. Insper measured Brazilian tax litigation at something close to 75% of GDP; the OECD average sits at 0.28%. That is not a typo — it is a difference of two orders of magnitude. The World Bank, in Doing Business 2020, timed 1,501 hours a year for a Brazilian company merely to assess its own taxes: first place among 190 countries, in a ranking nobody wants to climb. In an environment like that, overpaying is not carelessness by the CFO — it is the predictable behaviour of anyone managing prudently. Faced with an ambiguous rule, the diligent manager pays. And doubt, in a system of that density, costs systematically against whoever pays.
What accumulates from that behaviour has a legal name and a deadline. Article 168 of the Brazilian Tax Code gives five years to claim back what was unduly paid; article 173 deals with the other side of the same coin, the lapse of the right to assess. The practical consequence is a sliding window: sixty months wide, moving one month per month, always in the same direction. The credit from January five years ago is not lost by anyone's decision — it simply leaves through the back door, in silence, on the first day of the following month.
So far, a window that walks. What is new is that it is now also closing at the front. Complementary Law 214/2025 regulated the reform and phases out PIS and COFINS, giving way to CBS and IBS. Taxable events under the old system stop being produced — the stock of credits under the current regime stops growing and only shrinks. It is the difference between a tap dripping slowly and a tap shut off with the drain open: the first still leaves time to argue; the second has a date.
The test fits into a coffee break: ask the tax team for the assessment of the oldest month still inside the window — sixty months back, counted from the current month. Do not ask for the credit, ask only for the paperwork. If it appears in twenty minutes, the house is in order and the review will be quick. If it takes a week, you have just found out why nobody is looking over there — and what is leaving through the back door while the file is being searched for.
Diagnosis with defined scope, timeline and price; every thesis classified by risk, in writing, before any decision of yours. Execution follows the administrative route, with a calculation trail — and remuneration falls on realised benefit.
Official sources, at the exact point — the article of law, the service or the search you can use today. None replaces analysis of the specific case, which is our work.
No thesis moves forward without its classification written beside it. That is what separates a survey from a promise.
Say in two lines what you need to resolve. An account manager replies personally, in business hours, and the conversation starts where it makes a difference.
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