Mar 23, 2026
By MSC Gabriela Páez, Tax Manager
In practice, the audit model operates differently: the taxpayer is not exposed because the Tax Authority “guesses,” but because today there are legal grounds, case law, and mechanisms already operating that make it possible to require bank account information under administrative and judicial control. In addition, today information may be exchanged with other jurisdictions when there are international legal instruments in force. This environment makes risky certain beliefs, or the desire to believe, such as: “buying” invoices, not reconciling, moving collections to accounts of related third parties, sustaining operations with unreal profits, or maintaining offshore structures without being able to justify need, substance, and traceability.
Bank secrecy does exist, but with express exceptions, and one of them is Taxation.
The legal starting point is Article 615 of the Commercial Code, amended by Law 9068, which maintains the inviolability of current accounts, but allows banks to provide information by order of the competent court and, in addition, includes an explicit exception for the General Directorate of Taxation when duly authorized.
This is important for business owners and individual taxpayers: the debate is not whether “secrecy” exists, but rather when the veil may be lifted and under what procedure. The law has already resolved that it is not absolute.
The Tax Authority does not “freely request” bank information: there is a formal judicial procedure.
The operational route is found in Article 106 ter of the Tax Code, which regulates the procedure to require information from financial entities. In essence, the request is filed by the Director General of Taxation before the Contentious-Administrative Court, and the financial entity must comply with the request when it is accompanied by the judicial resolution authorizing it.
For the taxpayer, this has practical implications:
If the Tax Authority opens an audit and detects inconsistencies in sales, VAT, informative returns, margins, etc., it does have a legal route to reach the banking system.
The taxpayer’s argument, for those who want to believe that “that is in the bank, they cannot see it,” has ceased to be an exit and is more a lie one wants to believe than a reality; today it is, at best, a false sense of security.
When There Is International Exchange, the Law Allows Information To Be Shared With Other Jurisdictions
Costa Rica may not only gather information: it may also exchange it when there are international instruments in force. Article 115 bis of the Tax Code establishes that the prohibition on disclosing information does not prevent transferring or using it when required by courts or tax administrations of other countries with which there is an international exchange agreement in force.
In addition, Law 9118 approved the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters, whose framework even contemplates automatic exchange of information where applicable.
In simple terms: if there are international traces, structures outside the country, accounts, or beneficiaries linked to other jurisdictions, today there is a legal basis to cooperate and exchange tax data.
Common Reporting Standard (CRS): Automatic Exchange of Financial Information Is Already Regulated by Resolutions of the DGT / Ministry of Finance
For the taxpayer, this translates as follows: if you have residence, links, accounts, or structures outside the country, or if you operate with international counterparties, the level of traceability and tax cooperation is much greater than it was a few years ago, and “offshore” has ceased to be synonymous with invisibility.
Under this framework, there are practices that have become risky. Not because they are “new,” but because there is now greater capacity for cross-checking and reconstruction of facts.
Official References (Costa Rica) Cited in the Article
Law 9068 (Law for Compliance with the Fiscal Transparency Standard) and amendment to Article 615 of the Commercial Code.
Tax Code, Article 106 ter (judicial procedure to require information from financial entities).
Tax Code, Article 115 bis (exchange of information with other jurisdictions).
Law 9118, Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters.
Resolution DGT-R-16-2020 (CRS) and normative references to its subsequent update.
Attorney General’s Opinion PGR C-012-2021 on the scope of bank secrecy and references to constitutional case law cited by the Attorney General’s Office.