More hands brought in to assess recommendations on adjusted ‘objective values’

The Finance Ministry committees tasked with the adjustment of so-called “objective values” (property rates used for tax purposes) seem unable to meet the challenge, prompting the ministry’s political leadership to form a task force to complete the job.

The second-level committee that had originally undertaken the task of shaping the new objective values on the basis of recommendations made by surveyors, has found that it needs input from experts, leading the ministry to set up a seven-member task force of tax officers, information technology experts, engineers and officials from the Bank of Greece and ELSTAT.

Ministry sources say that the processing of recommendations will be strictly technical and that politics will not be involved at all. They add that in the cases where the task force will identify a convergence in value proposals, it will refrain from sending the data to the second-level committee; it will instead ratify the recommendations and submit them directly to the political leadership. In cases where there is a significant disparity, the task force will propose what the objective values should come to, leaving the final decision to the committee.

As a result of these changes, the new objective values are likely to come into force in early June. Once the new rates are announced, the independent Authority for Public Revenues will examine who will have to pay more property tax and inform the ministry of its findings so that any decisions on changing tax rates can be taken.