Law-abiding firms to get VAT rebates within a week

By Prokopis Hatzinikolaou

The next tax bills that will be submitted in Parliament this month and in July will provide for the exemption of small enterprises from value-added tax, joint activity by the state’s collection mechanisms to retrieve expired debts to tax authorities and social security funds, the offsetting of debts between the state and taxpayers, and the payment of value-added tax rebates to enterprises within just one week.

Most of the tax amendments are included in the text of the revised agreement between the government and its creditors, some of which comprised prior actions required for the disbursement of bailout tranches. Finance Ministry officials say that the VAT system is about to be overhauled, as the country has told to its creditors it will introduce a new system that will apply as of January 2015.

Regarding the swift VAT rebate, the new regulations will provide for the creation of an automatic system for the validation of rebates that will be risk-based, using the history of each enterprise in the records of the General Secretariat for Public Revenues as the main factor that will determine when they get their VAT back.