British Virgin Islands: Updates related to TINs for FATCA regime

Reminder to all financial institutions that TIN information is mandatory when submitting FATCA returns

Updates related to taxpayer identification numbers (TINs) for the FATCA regime

Article Posted date 03 March 2022

The tax authority of the British Virgin Islands on 21 February 2022 issued updates related to taxpayer identification numbers (TINs) for the FATCA regime. 

The tax authority reminded all financial institutions that TIN information is mandatory when submitting FATCA returns, beginning with the 2020 reporting period.

  • If a financial institution submitted a return without a TIN, but used the acceptable sequential codes provided by the IRS, an error notification will be generated to indicate the entry is invalid. The filing will be accepted by the IRS, but the financial institution is required to make a correction within 120 days of receiving the error notification.
  • If the error is not corrected within 120 days, and the financial institution is contacted by the IRS, the financial institution must be prepared to provide significant evidence that establishes that the financial institution tried to obtain the TIN but was unsuccessful.

The tax authority also informed financial institutions that the BVI Financial Account Reporting System (BVIFars) Portal has been updated to include an “Issued by” option for account holders that were not assigned a TIN where the account has a substantial U.S. owner. The following steps need to be considered when under such circumstances:

  • The financial institution must include the TIN element for both the account holder and the substantial owner. If both are U.S. individual/entities, the financial institution should include a U.S. TIN for both. If one of them is a U.S. individual/entity and the other is foreign, the financial institution will not receive an error notification if it provides a valid US and a foreign TIN for the respective accounts in the TIN element place. If a foreign TIN is not available, the financial institution may provide the foreign individual/entity’s country code in the “TIN Issued by” element along with the characters “NA” to indicate “Not Available” in its TIN element.
  • If the financial institution omits the TIN element for either the account holder or the substantial owner, or inserts blank spaces, the financial institution will receive a “TIN not populated” error, regardless of whether the other TIN elements are populated with a U.S. TIN or not.

Read a March 2022 report [PDF 462 KB] prepared by the KPMG member firm in the British Virgin Islands

 

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