How to find a reliable provider of accounting services in Poland, how to find a good provider of accounting services in Warsaw or Cracow, how to find a good accounting office in Poland? What are the basic rules regarding the provision of accounting services in Poland?

Accounting services in Poland are provided by accounting offices in various organizational and legal forms (capital companies under commercial law or partnerships) as well as individuals offering their accounting services as freelancers, often working directly at the client’s premises or simply from their homes.

Most commonly, accountants in Poland are found through recommendations, which is an excellent source of information, or through the Internet, using popular search engines or local service websites that contain advertisements from individuals offering such services.

In the Polish market, popular local services through which one can find individuals providing accounting services in various Polish cities are local online services like OLX and Oferteo, but there are, of course, many other similar websites.

Currently, for accounting services provided in Poland, Polish regulations do not prescribe specific legal frameworks within which such services must be provided, nor do they impose legal requirements conditioning the provision of such services. People providing accounting services with long-term work experience will usually have a certificate from the Ministry of Finance issued before 2014 (qualification certificate). This certificate, issued based on the provisions of the Accounting Act, was necessary for professional bookkeeping and confirmed the professional qualifications of individuals providing such services. In 2014, there was a deregulation of the provisions concerning the provision of accounting services, and since then, such a certificate is no longer issued. Therefore, from that time, “anyone” can provide accounting services in Poland and “anyone” can establish an accounting office in Poland without having any qualifications for providing accounting services.

In this context, it is extremely important to “check” the qualifications of the person entrusted with accounting.

A list of people holding the Ministry of Finance’s certificate (these certificates have not expired and those who obtained them can still use them) is posted on the website of the Polish Ministry of Finance.

Although there are no statutory requirements regarding the competencies of people providing accounting services in Poland, they must provide such services in accordance with Polish law and based on the provisions of the Polish Accounting Act of 29 September 1994 (consolidated text Journal of Laws of 2023, item 120, as amended).

This Act specifies the principles of accounting and the conduct of activities related to professional bookkeeping in Poland, which accountants providing services for companies based in Poland must adhere to and comply with.

Under the Polish Accounting Act, there is the principle of so-called continuity of accounting books, which means the continuation of bookkeeping according to the same principles from the very beginning of the entity’s operation conducting such books in Poland. According to Article 5, paragraph 1 of the Polish Accounting Act, “The adopted accounting policies must be applied continuously, grouping economic operations, valuing assets and liabilities, including making depreciation or amortization charges, determining financial results and preparing financial statements in the same way in successive financial years so that the information derived from them is comparable for successive years. The balances of assets and liabilities shown in the accounting books at the close of the books must be included in the same amounts in the books opened for the next financial year.”

This means that it is neither legally permissible nor possible for “every new Polish accountant” (or Polish accounting office) working for a given Polish entity to have “new” accounting books and “new” rules for their maintenance. Therefore, it is extremely important, when changing a Polish accountant or accounting office serving a given Polish business entity, to hand over the complete accounting books with all entries up to the handover date to the successor who will provide accounting services in Poland. This enables the continuous maintenance of accounting books.

In practice, it sometimes happens that Polish accountants or accounting offices, for various reasons, refuse to hand over such books to a new entity (accountant, new accounting office). It should be noted here that this is an unacceptable practice even if the reason is the non-payment of all financial dues for accounting services provided to the given Polish entity. Such practice exposes the Polish accountant (persons managing the Polish accounting office) to liability for damages and even criminal liability for such actions (as indicated, even in the case of non-payment of all financial dues by the entity to the “previous” Polish accounting office/accountant).

Accounting books in Poland can be run at the entity’s headquarters (company) for which they are kept, or outside its headquarters, which is a common practice in the case of accounting managed by Polish accounting offices. However, in such a case, the manager of the Polish unit (company) is obliged to notify the relevant Polish tax office of the place where the accounting books are kept within 15 days from the date of their issuance and to ensure the availability of accounting books along with accounting evidence to authorized external control or supervision bodies at the unit’s headquarters (company) or at the place of management or another place with the consent of the Polish control or supervision body.

If you are interested in accounting services in Poland, accounting services provided by our accounting office in Poland, please contact our accounting office:

Our accounting office provides accounting services in Warsaw and Cracow.

Accounting Office Cracow:
PHONE: +48 12 345 21 06
EMAIL: biuro.krakow@prwt.pl

Accounting Office Warsaw:
PHONE: +48 22 292 47 21
EMAIL: biuro.warszawa@prwt.pl