As per current legislation, acts committed by individuals and legal persons, as well as associates, stakeholders and representatives of legal persons, in breach of fiscal, financial or customs laws, are noted in their tax offense record and erased after five years.
This system will be changed by the Government, so that the act will be erased after a varying period of time, depending on the severity of the infraction. The Government argues that contraventions present lower risk and consequences than crimes, as regards tax evasion, says a draft ordinance obtained by MEDIAFAX.
The changes say individuals and companies guilty of contraventions covered by fiscal, financial and customs laws may request to have the act struck from their tax offense record one year after the punishment decision becomes final, even if the fine was paid within the first year. If the fine was not paid within one year, then the record will be struck when it is paid, but no later than five years after the final decision.
Similarly, in the case of joint liability with an insolvent debtor, the company’s offense can be erased when the incurred debt is paid, but not earlier than one year after the fiscal authority’s final decision, and no later than five years after the decision.
Crimes covered by fiscal, financial and customs laws can be erased from the tax offense record after five years, as long as no similar acts are committed in the intervening period.
The Government has also changed the rules applying to firms declared inactive because they failed to uphold their reporting obligations in an entire semester. A firm that was declared inactive because it avoided a fiscal inspection by reporting a false address for its headquarters can have this offense erased only three months after it is reactivated.
No changes have been brought to the provisions that say tax offense records may be erased when the specific acts are no longer punished by law, when the company/individual has been rehabilitated de jure or by a court decision, or in the case of the taxpayer’s death.