Draft law of measures to combat evasion

The Ministry of Finance published on its website on September 19, 2023, the Draft Law on Certain Fiscal Budgetary Measures to Ensure Romania’s Long-Term Financial Sustainability (“the Project”) and its explanatory statement.

We present measures to combat tax evasion.

Measures to prevent and combat illegal production, trade or service provision activities are regulated, namely:

• The prohibition of engaging in manufacturing, warehousing, transportation, trade or services with goods not accompanied by documents of origin,
• the obligation that such activities be carried out in compliance with the conditions stipulated by law, through the application of the fine and the measure of confiscation, whether in custody, transportation, or marketing.
• The procedure concerning the termination of unavailability and return of unavailable goods; signing of the report and refusal of the offender to sign it; provisions concerning goods for which there is a danger of theft are regulated.
• In all cases in which the existence of circumstances concerning the commission of acts provided for by criminal law is established in relation to the submitted acts, notice shall be given to the competent criminal investigation bodies.
• The identification of contraventions and the enforcement of contravening penalties are carried out by the competent bodies of the National Agency for Tax Administration (ANAF) and the Romanian Customs Authority (ANV), as well as the authorized representatives of the National Authority for Consumer Protection .
• The specimen of the report on the detection and punishment of fines and the custody report shall be established by the competent bodies within 30 days after the entry into force of the law.
• Criteria for the application of the additional sanction of suspension of activity are approved by joint order of ANAF and ANV.

Penalties:

Failure to comply with these provisions constitutes a misdemeanor, in addition to confiscation of property, if not committed under conditions that could be considered, according to criminal law, a crime, and is punishable:
– with a fine of 2,000 lei to 15,000 lei if committed by natural persons,
– with a fine of 5,000 lei to 30,000 lei if committed by legal persons.

If, within the period of 12 months from the date of application of the last sanction for committing the above contravention, the offender commits a new contravention for which he was sanctioned, the following shall apply:
– fine from 4,000 lei to 30,000 lei if committed by natural persons,
– fine from 10,000 lei to 60,000 lei if committed by legal persons,

as well as the additional penalty consisting of suspension of its activity, consisting of transportation, storage and/or marketing, as the case may be, for a period of up to 15 days.

Therefore, we recommend checking and keeping all documents related to the receipt of goods (CMR, transport documents, contracts etc).

For any further information, please contact us by email/phone.