At the first consultation, the questions come in the same order, and none of them concerns the merits: “Which court do I go to?”, “How much will it cost me to start proceedings?”, “How long will it take?”. These are the right questions. A tax dispute is rarely lost because the lawyer failed to find the argument; it is lost because the case was filed with the wrong court and was declined after eight months.
Subject-matter jurisdiction in tax and administrative litigation is laid down by Article 10(1) of Legea nr. 554/2004, as amended by Legea nr. 212/2018, which raised the former 1,000,000 lei limit.
The administrative and tax litigation division hears at first instance disputes concerning acts of local and county public authorities, as well as those concerning taxes and duties, contributions, customs debts and their late-payment charges (accesorii: interest and penalties), of less than 3,000,000 lei.
The administrative and tax litigation division hears at first instance disputes concerning acts of central public authorities, as well as those concerning taxes and duties, contributions, customs debts and their accesorii, of more than 3,000,000 lei.
Subject-matter jurisdiction is a matter of public policy: it can be raised by anyone, at any stage, including by the court of its own motion. The consequence of a mistake is not a fine, but time: a declinature of jurisdiction, a possible conflict of jurisdiction between courts, and the procedure needed to resolve it. Several good months, in a case where interest keeps running.
Is the threshold applied to the principal amount, or to the total including the accesorii? This is where borderline cases are decided: 2,750,000 lei in principal means the tribunal, but 3,230,000 lei including the accesorii means the court of appeal. Article 10(1) lists ”taxes and duties, contributions, customs debts, as well as their accesorii”, wording that suggests aggregation. This is also the position taken consistently at the practice-unification meetings: the solution adopted at the 2016 meeting of the presidents of the administrative and tax litigation divisions in Oradea was that the principal obligations and the accesorii should be added together, and the opinion of the National Institute of Magistracy (INM) discussed in 2025 maintains this solution, on the ground that the accesorii are not based on “different facts or causes” from the principal, even where they are established by separate administrative-fiscal acts.
NOTE: Opinions of the INM and the minutes of meetings addressing divergent practice are not binding on the courts, unlike decisions of the High Court of Cassation and Justice (ÎCCJ) given on an appeal in the interest of the law or on a preliminary ruling on a point of law, and the question of aggregation has not, so far, been settled by such a binding ruling. They guide, they do not bind. In borderline cases, between 2.5 and 3.5 million lei including the accesorii, the risk of a declinature remains real, and the prudent strategy is to bring the action before the court indicated by the aggregation criterion, with jurisdiction expressly argued in the claim itself. A one-page paragraph at the outset saves a year.
Here a common misconception needs correcting: that the claimant can choose between the court of their own domicile and the court of the defendant's seat. That is no longer true.
Legea nr. 212/2018 amended Article 10(3) of Legea nr. 554/2004, and the current rule allows no alternative: a claimant who is an individual or a private-law legal person must apply exclusively to the court of their own domicile or seat; a claimant that is a public authority, public institution or equivalent body must apply exclusively to the court of the defendant's domicile or seat. Alternative jurisdiction was abandoned precisely because it generated forum shopping: identical claims were being filed with different courts, depending on their practice. Today, territorial jurisdiction is exclusive, and therefore also a matter of public policy. The provision has also passed constitutional review.
In practice, for a taxpayer domiciled in Brașov, the case is heard by the Brașov Tribunal or the Brașov Court of Appeal, depending on the value, regardless of which tax authority issued the act: an act issued by a central structure, or by a regional directorate in another county, does not move the case elsewhere. This is frequently an advantage: the dispute is conducted at home, before a body of practice you already know.
Contrary to the natural expectation that “if the amount is large, the fee will be large”, there is no percentage-based court fee for an action for annulment in tax and administrative litigation.
Article 16 of O.U.G. nr. 80/2013, unchanged in the form applicable in 2026, provides at point (a) that claims for the annulment of the act or, as the case may be, for recognition of the right claimed, and for the issuing of a certificate, confirmation or any other document, are subject to a court fee of 50 lei; and at point (b), that claims of a pecuniary nature, seeking also compensation for damage suffered through an administrative act, are subject to a fee of 10% of the amount claimed, but no more than 300 lei.
So: an action seeking the annulment of a tax assessment decision of 5,000,000 lei is subject to a court fee of 50 lei. This is not a misprint, and it is not an area with recent changes; the regime is stable. Note also the correction of a frequent confusion: Article 17 of O.U.G. nr. 80/2013 does not concern administrative litigation, but claims made under the Law on public notaries, Legea nr. 36/1995. The only provision relevant to the tax action is Article 16.
The rest of the picture: an application to suspend enforcement of the act is an area of divergent practice; some courts treat it as not capable of being valued in money and apply a fee of 20 lei (Article 27), others apply 50 lei (Article 16(a)). The practical recommendation: pay the 50 lei fee; the difference is insignificant, and the risk of having the application struck out as under-stamped, in an urgent procedure, is not worth taking. An appeal on points of law (recurs) is subject to a fee of 100 lei (Article 24). And ANAF, Romania's national tax administration, owes no court fee, being exempt as a public institution; the asymmetry is real, but it does not affect your budget.
NOTE: The court fee is paid in advance, on pain of the claim being struck out as unpaid, a formal defect that closes the case before any discussion of the merits. Do not confuse the fee, however, with the security: the fee (50 lei) is trivial, whereas the security for the suspension of enforcement is the real financial barrier. The security is not a court fee, but a sum lodged at the court's disposal, which is returned under the conditions laid down by law; for this reason, under the majority practice confirmed also by the case law of the Constitutional Court, it cannot be covered by public legal aid: Article 6 of O.U.G. nr. 51/2008 lists exhaustively the forms of that aid, and paying the security from public funds is not among them.
Calculated in bands on the amount in dispute, under Article 278(2) of the Tax Procedure Code. As a percentage, the larger the amount, the more affordable the security becomes.
10% of the amount in dispute.
1,000 lei plus 5% of the amount over 10,000 lei.
5,500 lei plus 1% of the amount over 100,000 lei.
14,500 lei plus 0.1% of the amount over 1,000,000 lei.
1,000 lei.
For 3,230,000 lei in dispute, the security is approximately 16,730 lei, under 0.6% of the amount at stake.
For individuals, O.U.G. nr. 51/2008 governs public legal aid in cumulative forms: payment of the lawyer's fee, payment of the expert's or translator's fee, payment of the bailiff's fee, as well as exemptions, reductions, staggered payment or deferral of court fees. The thresholds: average net monthly income per family member, over the two months before the application, below 500 lei, full coverage by the state; below 800 lei, the state advances 50%.
The law caps the total value of the aid that can be granted to a beneficiary, but the cap does not apply to the form consisting of exemptions, reductions, staggered payment or deferral of court fees; for these, the law imposes no monetary limit.
Realistically, in a tax dispute public legal aid does not matter for the court fee; 50 lei has stopped no one. It matters for the expert's fee, where the sums at stake run into thousands of lei. And it does not cover the security, which remains the only serious financial obstacle to a suspension.
The official figures should be read with caution: there is no public statistic devoted exclusively to the duration of tax disputes, but benchmarks do exist.
A statutory time limit of 45 days for resolving the administrative appeal; in practice, frequently months. After 6 months from filing without a reply, you may apply directly to the court (Article 281(5) of the Tax Procedure Code).
Nationally, in 2024, the average time to resolve non-criminal cases at first instance was approximately 248 days, an average across all subject-matters. A tax case involving expert evidence is systematically above it: the expert report alone adds between 6 and 12 months.
Administrative litigation accounts for around 30% of the workload of the tribunals and courts of appeal, and nearly 40% of that of the High Court. The appeal on points of law remains far from a quick procedure.
An honest estimate, from practice: from communication of the tax assessment decision to a final ruling, administrative appeal, first instance, appeal on points of law, a complete tax dispute is usually measured in 3 to 5 years. This is the figure that should underlie any decision, not the statutory 45-day time limit.
On filing, in advance. The only expense that the court cannot reduce when calculating litigation costs.
If you apply for a suspension. Lodged, not paid away; it is returned under the conditions laid down by law, but you need to have that liquidity available at the time of the application.
Negotiated; it may include a success-fee component.
The real point of cost. Under Article 331 of the Code of Civil Procedure, if the parties do not agree, the expert is appointed by drawing lots, and the court's order sets the terms of reference, the time limit and the provisional fee. It is advanced by the party that requested the evidence, with proof of payment to be filed within 5 days of the appointment, on pain of forfeiture of the right to the evidence. The provisional amount may be increased at the end.
The party-appointed expert, at your own expense, but frequently the most cost-effective expense in the case.
Copies from the administrative file, translations, travel.
The party that loses the case is required, on request, to bear the litigation costs (Article 453 of the Code of Civil Procedure). ANAF is no exception: exemption from the court fee does not exempt it from litigation costs owed to the winning party. If the claim is only partly allowed, the court apportions costs proportionately.
There is, however, a filter that surprises many taxpayers: Article 451(2) allows the court to reduce, even of its own motion, the part of the costs representing the lawyer's fee, where it is manifestly disproportionate to the value or complexity of the case or to the work carried out. The measure has no effect on the relationship between lawyer and client; the reduction concerns only what you recover from ANAF, not what you owe your lawyer. The court fee and witnesses' fees, by contrast, cannot be reduced.
The strategic consequence is the most important, and the least well known: by Decision no. 3/2020, given on an appeal in the interest of the law, the ÎCCJ held that a ground of appeal criticising the way the court ruled on the proportionality of costs representing the lawyer's fee does not fall within the grounds for quashing listed in Article 488(1) of the Code of Civil Procedure. In other words: if the first-instance judge reduces the fee, the reduction is, in practice, final.
From this follow two rules of procedural hygiene: file proof of the costs before the close of the hearing, and substantiate the fee with documentation, complexity, volume, duration, work performed. A partial recovery, between a third and two-thirds of the fee, is the usual outcome in tax cases.
Not every tax assessment decision needs to be challenged in court. Check, in order:
At 40,000 lei in dispute, where expert evidence is needed, the costs reach a significant fraction of the amount. At 3,000,000 lei, the same effort is marginal.
Not what you believe happened, but what you can prove with dated and traceable documents.
These change the equation completely: they are arguments capable of winning the case outright, independently of the merits. See the analysis on the nullity of the tax act.
A case won after 4 years, after enforcement was carried out against you in the third month, protects less than it appears to.
A suspension does not stop it; during its course, it is only late-payment penalties or non-declaration penalties that are not owed.
Chiefly a payment scheme (eșalonare la plată); it does not rule out the appeal, but it changes the pressure. See also the analysis on large amounts assessed after an inspection.
It is almost always worth it for: an expired limitation period, defects rendering the act null, tax bases built on unfounded estimates, large amounts. It is rarely worth it for: small amounts, with no procedural defects and no documents. And if you paid and win, the refund is made with interest, which matters, for large amounts and long durations.
The criterion agreed at the practice-unification meetings, including in the INM's 2025 opinion, which maintains the 2016 Oradea solution, is aggregation: 3,230,000 lei exceeds the threshold, so the court of appeal. These opinions are not, however, binding, and the question has not been settled by a binding ÎCCJ decision. In a borderline case, jurisdiction should be expressly argued in the claim, and the risk of a declinature managed from the first page.
Yes. Article 16(a) of O.U.G. nr. 80/2013 charges a fee of 50 lei on a claim for the annulment of an administrative act, whatever the amount in dispute. The 10% rate, capped at 300 lei, applies only to pecuniary claims that also seek compensation for damage. The financial barrier is not the fee, but the security required for a suspension.
No. Since 2018, a claimant who is an individual or a private-law legal person must apply exclusively to the court of their own domicile or seat (Article 10(3) of Legea nr. 554/2004). Jurisdiction is exclusive, a matter of public policy, and choosing a different court is sanctioned with a declinature.
Rarely in full. The court may reduce the fee, even of its own motion, if it considers it manifestly disproportionate (Article 451(2) of the Code of Civil Procedure), and under ÎCCJ Decision no. 3/2020 that reduction cannot be reviewed on appeal. File the evidence before the close of the hearing and document the fee; the court fee, by contrast, cannot be reduced.
Under the majority practice, confirmed also by the case law of the Constitutional Court, no. Article 6 of O.U.G. nr. 51/2008 lists exhaustively the forms of public legal aid, and the security is not a court fee, but a guarantee lodged at the court's disposal. Public legal aid nonetheless remains useful for the expert's fee, which is where the real cost of the case lies.
Informative material, updated on 18 July 2026. It does not constitute legal or tax advice; individual situations must be assessed on their own facts.
If the appeal period is already running, the other analyses on this subject are grouped under tax litigation. For the concrete stages of a dispute, see tax disputes.
Time limits run from the date of communication. A first conversation clarifies what is being alleged, what you need to substantiate and how the defence is built, before an estimate becomes a tax assessment decision.