ATHENS: Tax Inspectors are making frequent and surprise visits, mainly to restaurants, in order to assure new tax rate 23% (up from 13%) is being collected and reported correctly by taxpayers.
Fiscal receipts were in use since 1988 when Greece has enacted fiscal law (hard regulation) for the first time, mandating the use of fiscal devices (Government Gazette 222Α/05.10.1988). Since this introduction there has been several updates of device technical specifications over the years, covering variety of models to suite all business needs, including mobile devices to cover transportation. In time, fraudsters have discovered easy ways to keep separate set of books and again continue to dodge tax.
Contributing to the problem is an informal economy that accounts for about 25 % of Greece’s annual gross domestic product. Evasion is most common in the services sector where customers don’t receive a physical product (renting real estate), and it’s not limited to small businesses like plumbers and restaurants.
As the collection continuously drops, thanks to all the work-arounds fraudsters were able to utilise over the years, once again the Greek government is challenged to upgrade the system with new features, trying to stay ahead of the game. In 2012 there was announcement that fiscal cash registers will be interconnected to Tax Authority to enable remote control. However, this feature was bundled with other modernisation projects costing Tax Authority more than 500 million euros (combined with some affairs) never seem to be reaching production phase.
The experts say Greece has largely failed in previous crackdowns on tax evasion, which has been rampant for generations. An estimated 10 billion euros in taxes never makes it into government coffers annually — a significant factor in the country’s inability to pay its roughly 320 billion euros in national debt.
