Hundreds of millions in pending rebates

The tax administration is trying to contact thousands of taxpayers and businesses – not to investigate them, but to give taxes back to them.

According to data from the Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE), the amount due to “missing” taxpayers comes to no less than 280 million euros and it concerns both value-added tax and income tax refunds.

Following the processing of this year’s tax returns, the tax office is looking for 92,150 beneficiaries who are entitled to a total of €45 million but who have not declared their bank account details (IBAN).

Of these, 85,866 are individual taxpayers and are set to gain for a refund amounting to €13.5 million, while the rest are businesses that account for the lion’s share of the refunds.

AADE has also spent a period of more than 90 days looking for taxpayers and enterprises that are entitled to a total amount of €235 million. Either there is no contact information for them or they have not submitted the required supporting documents to credit them with the relevant amounts due to them.

It is noted that according to an announcement issued by the tax administration, it is now optional for citizens to disclose the IBAN of their bank account before submitting an income tax return, provided they are not entitled to a refund.

For those taxpayers who receive an income tax refund, they must proceed with an IBAN declaration before submitting their tax return in order to be refunded the amount.

In AADE’s business plan for this year there is a provision for VAT refunds with very fast procedures by utilizing the resources of the Recovery Fund. However, the tax administration states that the goal is to eliminate pending applications of more than 90 days and to make all refunds faster and automatic.

This is because the new plan of the tax office provides for VAT refunds without the intervention of the tax authorities.

Based on the state budget execution data, in the first five months of the year tax refunds (not only VAT) amounting to €2.6 billion have been made, while by the end of the year it has been estimated that taxes amounting to €6.58 billion will be refunded.