Debt pay plan to depend on participation
Over 3.9 million citizens have debts to the tax authorities, according to data published on Friday by the Independent Authority for Public Revenue. It remains to be seen how many of them will enter the new payment plan for up to 120 tranches and what amount they will decide to pay.
That is because most debtors have dues that do not exceed 5,000 euros each and are currently in arrears of just 1 percent of that amount to the state.
The new figures showed that the expired dues created this year had reached 2.63 billion euros by end-March, of which 2.5 billion concerned unpaid taxes. The same data showed that collections slowed down as some taxpayers have stopped paying their installments: Debt arrangements and forced collections fetched 1.296 billion euros in the first quarter of the year, against 1.415 billion euros in the same period last year.
Finance Ministry officials attribute that decline in takings to the expectation that the new regulation about the arrangement of dues in 120 tranches will also include the debts created this year. However, the bill clearly shows that 2019 dues remain off the new settlement.
