Over 10 billion lei from VAT are blocked in Moldova’s state budget on accounts which cannot be used by companies for their development.
Finance Minister of Dumitru Budianschi said this while speaking in Parliament. He noted that in order to increase business access to liquidity, to ensure economic growth, one of the new measures to support the business environment in 2023, provided by the fiscal policy for 2023, will be the implementation of the concept of VAT refund amount accumulated on accounts, starting from January 1, 2023. According to him, this measure is designed to radically change the relationship between business and state. The Head of the Ministry of Finance explained that over the past years, over 10 billion lei have accumulated in the state budget in the form of VAT on accounts. These funds were formed largely as a result of the difference in VAT rates throughout the value chain. At the same time, Dumitru Budianscgi did not rule out that this huge amount of VAT was also contributed to by certain tax evasion schemes. At the same time, according to Finance Minister, even if there is a small part of enterprises which were unfairly forced to block these resources and could not use them for development, the created situation is a serious obstacle for the development of enterprises and a significant drawback for increasing the competitiveness of domestic enterprises. The Minister of Finance explained that in this situation, the Government came up with a new policy for the first time to refund the amount of VAT accumulated on accounts, starting from January 1, 2023. "It is a difficult task, because some of these sums have been accumulated, including tax evasion schemes, so the Government will develop a mechanism to ensure the right on refund of VAT on accounts only to those who work legally. At first this mechanism will be applied to the companies using tax invoices generated in the e-Factura system and/or tax receipts issued by the control and cash register equipment connected to the MEV system, i.e. connected online to the tax authorities," said Dumitru Budianschi. The Ministry of Finance notes that it is proposed to introduce, starting from January 1, 2023, a mechanism of refund of VAT accumulated on accounts, in conditions when the current system creates financial difficulties for businesses, given the fact that economic agents who do not have the status of exporters are not eligible for refund of VAT accumulated on accounts. Thus, the new concept will provide for VAT refund to business entities registered as VAT payers, which will accumulate amounts of VAT to be deducted. The system will have a positive impact on business by increasing the speed of circulation of financial resources, creating the necessary liquidity for economic activity. // 13.12.2022 – InfoMarket
