What your accountant should do each quarter in Spain

You send the invoices. Your accountant sends an amount to pay. The quarter disappears into a folder, and you return to running the business. That exchange tells you very little about the work between those two messages.

A useful quarterly accounting service should make that work understandable: which records were checked, what remains uncertain, what you must pay and what needs attention next. This is the service standard proposed in this guide. Whether a particular report or meeting is included depends on the engagement you have agreed, alongside the duties that apply to the professional relationship.

Spanish contracts bind the parties to their express terms and to consequences consistent with good faith, usage and law. Civil Code, Article 1258. A checklist helps you discuss service quality; it does not turn every suggested deliverable into an automatic legal entitlement.

Use the following process to assess your own service. It makes no claim about what most accounting firms do. You can judge your adviser much more fairly by asking for the evidence from your last quarter.

Agree what the quarter includes before it starts

Ask for a short written service description. It should identify the activities and entities covered, the records you provide, the adviser responsible and the work included in the fee. If bookkeeping, payroll or annual accounts sit with another provider, record who connects their work to the tax returns.

One practical distinction is between preparation and judgement. Someone may enter invoices accurately without being responsible for advising on an unusual overseas transaction. A payroll provider may supply the employment figures while another professional prepares the withholding return. Make those handovers explicit. Otherwise, asking whether tax advice is included produces an answer too broad to use.

Hiring an adviser does not let you transfer your tax obligations away by private agreement: Article 17.5 of the General Tax Act preserves their effect before the tax administration. General Tax Act, Article 17. That does not settle whether an adviser has breached a duty or owes compensation. It explains why you still need to know who is handling an obligation and whether it has been completed.

For each recurring task, agree an output. Instead of a vague promise to review the quarter, ask what the review covers and how exceptions reach you. A brief note attached to the quarter can be enough. You do not need to buy a lengthy report merely to discover whether a missing invoice was chased.

Also agree your side of the arrangement. Set a date for delivering records, a channel for unusual transactions and a response deadline when the adviser needs information. If you send an incomplete folder after the agreed cut-off, ask for an explicit assessment of the consequences. Silence from either side is a poor way to manage a filing deadline.

Start with your actual filing obligations

Your service should have a calendar built around your business. The list below explains common forms; it is not an instruction to submit all of them. The relevant territory, activity, tax regime and transactions determine what applies. Businesses under foral rules, Canary Islands indirect taxation or special arrangements need their own assessment.

Form	What the adviser should establish	What you should be able to ask
Modelo 303	Whether VAT returns apply, the reporting frequency and the correct treatment of the transactions	Which records support the figures, and which items need explanation?
Modelo 130	Whether direct-estimation IRPF payments apply and whether an exception is relevant	Why do I file it, or why am I excluded?
Modelo 111	Which payments fall within the withholding categories covered by this form	Have the relevant employment and professional-payment records reached the preparer?
Modelo 115	Whether rental or subletting payments create a relevant withholding obligation	Has the adviser reviewed the arrangement rather than assumed every rent payment is identical?
Modelo 349	Whether reportable intra-Community transactions exist and which filing frequency applies	Have new EU customers or suppliers changed the calendar?
Modelo 202	Whether corporation tax instalments apply	When does the next payment arise and how will the estimate reach me?

For quarterly VAT filers, Modelo 303 normally covers filing windows of 1–20 April, July and October, and 1–30 January for the fourth quarter; a non-working final day moves the deadline to the next working day. AEAT, Modelo 303 deadlines.

Modelo 130 is an IRPF payment on account for economic activities in direct estimation; qualifying professional activities can be exempt from that payment obligation when at least 70% of the previous calendar year’s relevant income was subject to withholding or payment on account. New activities have a specific reference-period rule, so the percentage alone is not a complete eligibility test. AEAT, Modelo 130 instructions.

Modelo 111 covers withholding and payments on account on employment income and economic activities, among other specified income categories. AEAT, Modelo 111. Modelo 115 concerns withholding and payments on account on income from renting or subletting urban property. AEAT, Modelo 115. The form names describe their subject; the adviser still has to check your obligation and any relevant exception.

AEAT provides monthly and quarterly filing arrangements for Modelo 349, the recapitulative statement of intra-Community transactions. AEAT, Modelo 349 periods. Under the general Modelo 202 calendar, corporation tax instalments fall in the first twenty calendar days of April, October and December. Check applicable adjustments and territorial exceptions with your adviser. AEAT, Modelo 202 deadlines.

The calendar also needs practical milestones. The tax return deadline and the direct-debit instruction deadline can differ; AEAT publishes separate columns for them in its 2026 calendar. AEAT, payment and filing deadlines. Ask for the records cut-off and decision date as well. A reminder arriving on the final filing day may leave very little room to resolve a missing document or payment problem.

For calculations rather than service expectations, use the separate quarterly VAT and income tax checklist.

What should happen before anyone presses submit

Article 25 of the Commercial Code requires orderly accounts appropriate to the business, with a chronological record of transactions and periodic balances and inventories. Commercial Code, Article 25. Within that framework, the following review sequence is an operational recommendation. The exact checks and accounting records must fit your activity and engagement.

Ask the adviser to identify missing records, reconcile the records available, resolve or document discrepancies, and explain the proposed filing before submission. This sequence makes a review easier to follow; it is not a statutory checklist prescribed by Article 25. Commercial Code, Article 25.

Begin with completeness. Did the adviser receive all the sales records and purchase documents expected for the period? Did any bank account, payment processor or invoicing system change? A folder containing many files can still omit an entire source of activity. Request a specific missing-items list, with someone assigned to obtain each item.

Next, ask how the records reconcile. In a hypothetical online shop, a payment provider transfers the proceeds after deducting fees and refunds. A useful review would ask whether the sales records, deductions and bank settlement can be followed through. That example is a suggested control, not a claim that every mismatch represents tax evasion or an accounting error.

Unexplained differences deserve a conclusion. They might come from timing, duplication, a missing record or a transaction that needs different treatment. Ask the preparer to record the explanation and any remaining uncertainty. A question that stays open should have a next action, rather than vanish when the tax return is submitted.

Documents need a substantive check as well. For VAT deduction, AEAT requires the appropriate supporting document to comply with the legal and regulatory requirements; the document depends on the transaction. AEAT, supporting documents. A useful question is whether the adviser has enough evidence for the treatment proposed, rather than whether a file has successfully uploaded.

AEAT sets several conditions for deducting input VAT, including use in the business or professional activity and the rules applicable to activities with and without a deduction right. AEAT, VAT deduction requirements. Ask for specific advice before assuming that every business purchase produces the same deduction.

Before approving the filing, request an explanation of changes that matter to you. If the amount payable has risen, what caused it? If the adviser cannot yet explain the movement, when will they resolve it? You should not have to work backwards through tax forms to find out whether the difference reflects business activity, a correction or an incomplete record.

What proactive contact looks like during the year

A useful message arrives when you can still do something with it. For this guide, proactive service means agreeing which events trigger a conversation and who starts it. The suggested rhythm below is a service design, not a claim about a universal legal duty to telephone clients at particular intervals.

First quarter: confirm the starting position

Confirm the current list of obligations with your adviser, including the records they expect and any unresolved items carried forward. Discuss changes planned for the year: a first hire, new premises, foreign customers or a different way of collecting payments. You want an early assessment of those changes; each one needs its own analysis before anybody assigns a tax obligation.

This is also a useful moment to test access. Can you find the last filed return? Can the adviser contact the person who holds the missing records? Who covers an absence? An agreed procedure is easier to use after both sides have tried it on an ordinary question.

Second quarter: review how the arrangement is working

Use the next quarter to assess the process itself. Are the same documents arriving late? Are you sending business questions to an inbox intended only for invoices? Ask for a small change that addresses the cause, such as a clearer upload checklist or a named person to approve an unusual transaction.

Discuss the coming holiday period before it affects availability. Decide who answers a records query and who confirms any payment arrangements while the owner or adviser is away. This is ordinary planning; it need not involve another meeting if a short written exchange settles it.

Third quarter: raise changes before the year closes

Bring up decisions still ahead of you. A proposed investment, recruitment plan or financing need may call for advice beyond return preparation. Give the adviser the facts before you commit, and ask whether they can advise within the current engagement or need to scope additional work.

For example, an owner planning to buy equipment can ask what documents and forecasts the adviser needs to assess the proposal. The useful response may be a request for more information. An adviser who resists giving an immediate tax-saving answer without the facts is not necessarily being unhelpful.

Fourth quarter: connect the quarter to annual work

Ask how the final quarter connects to the annual obligations that apply to you, and which records need attention before the next filing period. Some taxpayers are exempt from filing the annual Modelo 390 and must provide the required annual information in their final Modelo 303 instead. AEAT, Modelo 390 exemptions. Your year-end list should identify the applicable route rather than simply reuse another client’s checklist.

For a company, discuss who prepares annual accounting work and how it connects with the quarterly records. For a freelancer, ask what additional information the adviser will need for the annual return if that service is included. Confirm the fee and responsibility early. Neither party should have to guess whether annual work forms part of a monthly package.

The alerts worth agreeing in advance

You can set a useful alert policy without demanding constant contact. Ask for an alert when a missing record prevents a conclusion, an unusual transaction needs a decision, a payment estimate changes materially or a filing problem requires action. Agree what material means for your business instead of borrowing a percentage from a generic template.

A practical message should tell you what happened and why it matters, then identify the decision or document needed. It should name the person responsible and the date for responding. A request for one identified invoice gives you a task you can complete. A broad request to send everything urgently leaves you searching the same folder again.

Reserve a separate channel for official notices or live deadlines. Ask who monitors the relevant communications, under what authority, and how they alert the business. Do not assume that the person filing your quarterly returns also watches every notification or handles disputes. If a notice has already arrived, use the guidance on receiving a Spanish tax office letter and establish ownership immediately.

What you should receive after filing

For the service proposed here, the quarter ends with a short handover. Ask for the submitted returns and filing receipts, an explanation of the payment arrangements, a readable account of significant movements and the remaining action list. Put that handover into the agreed scope.

A receipt shows what was submitted. Your review should separately establish how any amount due is being paid and who will check the relevant payment status. Avoid relying on an informal message saying the quarter is finished when the payment arrangements still need attention.

The explanation can be brief. A freelancer may find a page showing the period’s income and expenses, the basis of the relevant estimates and the unresolved questions more useful than a dashboard full of unexplained figures. A company may need a balance sheet and profit and loss review, with further management reporting agreed around its decisions. These are proposed deliverables, not identical requirements for every business.

Provisional figures should be labelled. If a report excludes a missing supplier document, you need to know that before relying on it. Keep the action list after the handover: record the open item, who owns it and when you will next hear about it.

Keep the records somewhere the business can find them. A useful practical test is whether you can locate a return, its receipt and the associated explanation without asking the adviser to resend everything. Choose an access arrangement that protects confidential information and remains workable when someone is absent.

Compare the evidence with the service you bought

Choose the reporting level according to the decisions you need to make, then put the deliverables and responsibilities into the engagement. This recommendation respects the role of the agreed terms without treating the contract as the only possible source of professional duties. Civil Code, Article 1258.

To review your last quarter, bring the engagement, one document request, the filed returns and whatever handover you received. Ask the adviser to walk you through them. Mark each suggested control as evidenced, unclear or outside the agreed service. That is more useful than assigning a score that pretends to diagnose negligence.

If the work exists but the explanation is poor, request a clearer handover. If a recurring task has no owner, name one and set a review date. If your business now needs expertise the current arrangement cannot provide, assess the wider support described in when your business outgrows its accounting firm.

Take this checklist to a conversation with TaxFactory about the service your business needs. Ask which reviews, communications and reports the proposed engagement covers, and how additional work would be agreed. If you decide to move, plan the transfer between accounting firms around the live obligations and records. The next useful step is a defined quarterly process that both you and your adviser can actually follow.

Frequently asked questions

Is my accountant legally required to call me every quarter?

A fixed quarterly call is a service term to agree, not a universal schedule established by the rules cited in this guide. The Civil Code also recognises consequences of contracts arising from good faith, usage and law. Check the engagement, the relevant facts and the work promised before deciding whether silence represents a breach. For service planning, agree when the adviser will contact you and which events need an earlier conversation. Civil Code, Article 1258.

Should every freelancer file Modelo 130 and Modelo 303?

No. Modelo 130 concerns direct-estimation activities and includes exceptions for qualifying professional income subject to withholding. VAT returns can be monthly or quarterly. Ask your adviser to identify the forms and frequency that apply to your activity and tax regime, with the reason for any exemption. Two freelancers in a similar sector can have different filing obligations. AEAT, Modelo 130 instructions; AEAT, Modelo 303 filing periods.

What should I receive after the quarterly returns have been filed?

For the service standard proposed here, ask for the filed returns and submission receipts, the payment method and status, a concise explanation of the figures, and any unresolved items with owners and dates. Specify these deliverables in the engagement. A filing receipt and a bank debit answer different questions, so the handover should explain both rather than relying on a message that says everything is done.

Does proactive advice mean a full financial report every month?

No. A small business may need a short explanation of the quarter and an agreed alert when something changes. More detailed management reporting or cash forecasting needs a defined scope, suitable records and a fee that covers the work. Choose the level of reporting around the decisions you make, and ask what is included before assuming that a filing package covers financial management.

Should I change accountants if I cannot find these checks?

First ask the current firm to show how it reviews, files and explains the completed quarterly work, then compare that evidence with the engagement. The work may exist without being communicated clearly. Ask for a specific improvement and an agreed review date. If capability is missing or responsibilities remain unresolved, plan a controlled transfer; protect any live deadline separately instead of waiting for the relationship review.