As a lawyer, I often have to check the contracts of the counterparties of my customers, but in addition to the legal audit of the contract itself, I always check the counterparties themselves for:
their real existence as entrepreneurs / enterprise existence;
registration with a fiscal (tax) authority, registration as a taxpayer under the simplified taxation system, the presence or absence of VAT payer status;
and also interested in their legal business history.
This process takes up to 15 minutes of working time, but at the same time, it can reveal the risks of working with a new counterparty, and possibly save the client his material values, money and time.
Of course, a beautifully drawn up contract, registration in all state registers and the absence of a negative judicial trace does not give a complete guarantee that the counterparty is conscientious and within the time period stipulated by the contract, he will fulfill his obligations in full. However, having carried out such a simple research, you will be able to weed out obvious scammers who, in the hope of disappearing after receiving an advance / product / service, are trying to conclude a contract with you.
So, let’s begin:
Is there a counterparty as a business entity:
We go to the website of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine
2,3:
usr.minjust.gov.ua/ua/freesearch

by the status of the organizational and legal form, we choose our counterparty:
an individual entrepreneur or 2. a legal entity
Most precisely, the system searches by the identification number of an individual entrepreneur or by the identification code of a legal entity (see similar abbreviations in the agreement in the section “Details of the parties” – “IN”, “INN”, “EDRPOU”, “OKPO”).
We enter the counterparty’s data into the search bar “WRITE”, prove that we are not a robot by writing the indicated numbers or choosing the necessary pictures, and we receive an answer to the request.
A. If the system returned that “nothing was found” at your request, then there are two options: either an error in the typed combination, or such an enterprise / entrepreneur does not exist.
B. If the system issued a table, then pay attention to the following:
B.1. the correct name of the company / entrepreneur: we check the data in the agreement with the register, priority for the register.
B.2. counterparty registration address: in the agreement with a legal entity, its registration address must be indicated, if the location of the enterprise is at a different address, then it is advisable to indicate two addresses in the agreement: registration and location.
B.3. Whether the business entity is in the process of liquidation or has already been liquidated – comments are unnecessary.
Having pressed the button “DETAIL”, pay attention to the following:
B.4. If the counterparty is an entrepreneur: pay attention to his types of activities – KVEDs (classifier of the type of economic activity) the types of activities indicated in the table must coincide with those types of services / work that they carry out under the contract. If this is not the case, then the counterparty and you may have additional obligations to pay taxes – more on this in the next article.
B.5. For a legal entity: pay attention to the head of the company and those who have the right to sign. If the contract specifies a different surname than the one in the register, that such a signatory must act on the basis of a power of attorney, a contract of order, other legally competently executed documents that must be attached to the contract. The signing of an agreement by a person who does not have the authority to do so, subsequently, may entail the recognition of such an agreement as invalid. Therefore, it is better to show maximum vigilance now than to look for solutions to the problem in the future.

Is the counterparty registered with the fiscal authority, does it pay taxes properly, and does the tax status specified in the agreement exist?
All this can be found at the links below by filling in the line: “tax number” for individuals and “EDRPOU” – for enterprises:
sfs.gov.ua/datao – is the counterparty registered with the fiscal authority;
sfs.gov.ua/businesspartner – whether or not he has a tax debt;
sfs.gov.ua/anulir_new – cancellation of the status of a VAT payer;
sfs.gov.ua/reestr_new – status of a VAT payer;
sfs.gov.ua/rpep – the status of a taxpayer under the simplified system.

Forensic history

reyestr.court.gov.ua/ – by specifying the ID of the entrepreneur or the code of the company, you can find out whether there were any legal proceedings in this subject, the circumstances of the economic, civil, criminal, administrative case, if they are in the register.

If nothing was found in the search result, try checking the owner of the company and / or director.

After checking your counterparty in all the register – make a decision on cooperation with a new counterparty.

I hope this article will be useful to you.

Profitable deals.

Leonid Viktorov

1 (other party to the contract)

2, this service allows you to receive a paid and free request for information, for the purpose of checking the existence of such an entrepreneur / enterprise in the Unified State Register of Enterprises and Individual Entrepreneurs, a free request is enough, but if you want to generate a written confirmation, you can spend up to 50 UAH. , get an extract from the register and your counterparty, where a more complete list of information will be indicated, but to check the counterparty for our purposes, the information received on a free request will be enough.

3 some employers require their future employees to obtain a certificate stating that the latter are not entrepreneurs. Living in the 21st century, you can not waste time traveling to the Unified State Register and not stand in a queue at a government institution on a visiting day, this can be done online by ordering a paid certificate.