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ANAF’s fiscal control strategy has been rethought. How companies are currently verified21 August 2023

ANAF's fiscal control strategy has been rethought. How companies are currently verified

The National Administration Agency has modernized its approach to fiscal controls and aligned it with international trends, which place more and more emphasis both on the voluntary compliance of companies right from the declaration of fiscal obligations, and on the application of progressive verification techniques, so that tax inspections become only the last link in the chain of control of tax authorities.

The new ANAF control strategy was explained right from the top of the institutional pyramid through a press release published directly by the Ministry of Finance, which specifies the cascading way in which the control actions currently carried out by the tax authority work.

Thus, as it appears from the document made public by the Ministry of Finance, the control activity becomes ANAF’s last lever to achieve fiscal compliance, the authority first applying other techniques aimed at encouraging taxpayers to comply with their fiscal obligations and pay their taxes on time to the state budget. This progressive approach to the forms and actions of fiscal control contributes, says the Ministry of Finance, to the harmonization of fiscal control procedures with international trends in the matter.

Voluntary compliance techniques first applied by ANAF

According to the statement issued by the Ministry of Finance, the National Fiscal Administration Agency, through the fiscal control structures, currently carries out two types of actions before actually carrying out detailed fiscal controls and inspections at companies.

More precisely, in a first phase, ANAF carries out documentary verification actions, which consist in carrying out a coherence analysis of the tax situation of the taxpayer/payer, based on the existing documents in the tax file of the taxpayer/payer, as well as on the basis of any information and documents sent by third parties or held by the tax authority, which are relevant for determining the tax situation.

Then, also in this early phase, where they discover inadvertences or problems, ANAF issues compliance notices to the companies, i.e. documents through which the tax inspectors convey to the taxpayers/payers presumptive to be selected for carrying out detailed inspections, the tax risks they have identified so as to allow companies to re-analyze and clarify their tax situation and notified risks. Companies thus have the opportunity to correct and fulfil their tax obligations on their own initiative, having available from the start the points of inconsistency identified by the inspector in their tax situation, whether it is about erroneous tax returns, differences in unpaid taxes to the state or other situations considered problematic by inspectors.

Taxpayers will have 30 days after receiving the notification to take the necessary steps to revise their tax situation – to submit declarations if they are missing, to correct any erroneously submitted declarations or to pay the tax differences identified by ANAF. After the 30 days, the tax inspector in charge of the case reanalyzes the situation of the notified company and, depending on the steps taken or not by the taxpayer during this period, decides whether to trigger the tax inspection by sending a notice.

These two types of techniques – documentary verification and notification of compliance, involve remote interaction with the targeted companies, requiring only an electronic or telephone exchange of information.

Only later and only depending on the results obtained in this first stage, ANAF goes further and subjects taxpayers with a high fiscal risk to proper fiscal control actions, namely: the fiscal inspection in the case of taxpayers who follow the Compliance Notice, does not correct and does not clarify the tax risks for which they have been notified or the anti-fraud control, in the case of taxpayers for whom there are indications of tax evasion.

The data on ANAF’s control actions will be public

In the same official position, published on the institution’s website, Finance Minister Marcel Boloș also explained that the data on the verification actions carried out by ANAF will be made public monthly: “We decided to have monthly reports that reconfirm ANAF’s commitment to taxation fairness and fiscal transparency. We focus on revenue collection and reducing tax evasion, to expose fraud attempts. We are committed to providing guidance to taxpayers to rectify any discrepancies, but are determined to enforce the law and accelerate increased collection. It is a matter of common sense to all who pay their taxes correctly, to ensure that economic and social measures to protect citizens and the economy are funded. We will continue to actively review internal processes, we want to adopt new digital solutions and make better use of data analysis to streamline inspections, especially in high-risk areas.

The most recent data published by the ministry are for the month of June, and they show that ANAF issued over 3,700 compliance notices for fiscal risks totalling approximately 284 million lei. Also, in the same period, more than 3,200 tax control actions were carried out with additional tax obligations of almost 1 billion lei and almost 2,000 anti-fraud controls with implications of 2.6 billion lei.

The Ministry of Finance emphasizes that this cascading control procedure, harmonized with international trends, is part of a wider set of fiscal reforms, aimed at modernizing and digitalizing the fiscal administration policy of companies, and solutions such as SAF-T electronic reporting, e -Transport and e-Invoice will allow tax inspectors real-time access to data on economic transactions carried out by companies, which should contribute substantially to increasing tax collection and reducing tax evasion.

 

Article published in TaxMagazine

Alina Andrei

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