Additions to the instruction “On tax procedures in the Republic of Albania”, as amended

Official Bulletin no.4, dated 19 January 2017

Minister of Finance by Instruction no. 7, dated 01.10.2017 makes some amendments to Instruction no 24 dated 2.9.2008 “On Tax Procedures in the Republic of Albania”, as amended.

First, in terms of the structure of the tax appeal, the Directorate of Tax Appeal is an integral part of organic structure of the Ministry of Finance since January 1, 2017. The Commission of Tax Appeals Review is established in the Ministry of Finance for consideration and decision of Tax Appeals, for amounts over 20 million lek.

Significant amendments have been made in cases where the tax administration finds commercial activities without being registered. When this authority identifies persons who exercise economic and commercial activity without being registered in the National Business Center, it orders the measure of blocking goods and forces the person to be immediately registered in the National Business Center as a taxpayer of the value added tax.

If the goods are being transported or are loaded on a vehicle, the measure has also been taken against the vehicle.

Measure of blocking goods and vehicle is removed after the registration of the economic activity.
Once is registered the taxpayer he is provided with VAT tax invoices and fulfill an invoice prepared by the purchaser, with the data of inventory of goods, then being submitted to Regional Tax Directorate for tax assessment.

If a person carries out activities in the field of services, in addition to the measure of blocking in the country where a violation is found, the suspension of permit/license/authorization for the exercise of activity is proposed to the competent authorities for an period of 6 months.

If measure of blocking is taken against the taxpayer and he undermines the distinctive signs of blocking the activity, against him is taken the measure of seizure and confiscation of the entire quantity of goods.
If a taxpayer carries out economic activity in a secondary address registered in NBC, the taxpayer is not considered to perform economic activity without being registered, but penalties are applied to him for not updating the database. Whereas reassessment of sales in the same amount to the market value is carried out for the goods.

Regarding the passive registry, for the period of stay in the passive registry, the taxpayer does not submit periodic tax report and penalties are not applied to him for failure to submit tax return.
During the period that the taxpayer is the status / passive registry, tax responsibilities can not be added or amended to him.

Moving from passive to active register (reactivation) is done immediately, without being subject to unpaid taxes and / or tax return not submitted by the taxpayer. For the unpaid liabilities and / or not submitted statements (tax return) all procedures are applied and all legal steps are taken to fulfill these obligations.

For taxpayers who are reactivated in NBC, as a result of withdrawal of the suspension of the activity, the transition from passive into active register of tax administration is done automatically by the electronic system of NBC in the GDT system, on the date of adoption of activation in NBC.

For taxpayers seeking to reactivate at RTD, activation is done immediately by the Regional Tax system and the activation date will be the date of the request for reactivation.

A notification is sent to the taxpayer in his account / electronic address or one of the communication ways specified by law for all cases of activation.

Any transaction carried out by the taxpayer, which are at passive registry is deemed an administrative offense and shall be punished in accordance with the legal provisions.

In addition, for every transaction made by a purchaser taxpayer with a seller taxpayer in the passive registry, published on the official website of taxation in the list of passive taxpayers, is considered a violation both for the seller and for the purchaser.

In addition, as amended, the taxpayer, in terms of financial difficulties, may be allowed at any time and whenever it is necessary to conclude installment payment agreement.

Installment payment agreement shall be in writing, within 10 working days from the date of submitting the application, provided that the taxpayer immediately pays 20% of the liability, for which installment payment agreement is concluded.

Installment payment agreement may be concluded for tax liabilities as a result of self-declaration (self-assessment) as well as for tax liabilities as a result of the tax assessment made by the tax administration.

Installment payment agreement can not be concluded for the tax liability of the self-declared taxpayer, which is calculated or collected, or held by him, including social and health insurance contributions.
Installment payment agreement may be concluded even when the force collection of taxes to the taxpayer has started.

If procedures for seizure of taxpayer’s property have started, the installment payment agreement may not be concluded.

Finally, regarding administrative penalties, if the verification and control in the business location show that the taxpayer has not declared in the taxation authority every recently employed at least one calendar day before starting work, apart from the obligation to pay the amount of tax liabilities and social and health insurance contributions, calculated from the date of finding, he is punished by a penalty for each undeclared employee.

This penalty does not apply in case of verification and control on the location of activity of self-employed natural person, are identified persons over 16 years who are categorized as unpaid family persons.

Identification of the unpaid family person is done by the identity card, driving license or passport. Failure to display the price list of the sale of goods or services is punishable by a fine.
In cases where prices are listed in the packing box of goods as in the case of medicines, then the trading entities are not subject to the obligation to display the price list.

Those taxpayers, who can not predetermine fixed prices for the services that perform, are not subject to the obligation to display the price list, due to the costs that may burden the service price.
In the case of services to a specific nature (e.g. travel agencies ticket prices), the price of which varies and is not predetermined, hourly service fees may be displayed.