The Revenue and Customs Administration (UPC) collected 1,09 billion euros in tax revenue last year, said the acting director of that institution, Milena Petričević, and added that 15 proposals for the initiation of bankruptcy proceedings were submitted.
She stated that the revenue of the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund (PIO), 29,11 percent, value added tax (VAT) 24,28 percent, while personal income tax accounts for 15,69 percent, are the most represented in the collection structure.
"Incomes from the Health Insurance Fund account for 15,3 percent, corporate income tax 6,76 percent, concessions 2,84 percent, employment agency revenues 2,28 percent, real estate sales tax 1,78 percent, while other revenues account for 1,67 .XNUMX percent," Petričević said in an interview with the Mina-business agency.
When it comes to customs revenues, the gross collection amounted to 776,53 million euros.
"In the structure of collected customs revenues, VAT on imports is the most represented with 63,85 percent, then excise taxes with 32,31 percent, customs with 3,53 percent, coffee tax with 0,29 percent and other revenues with 0,02 percent", Petričević stated.
She stated that last year the UPC initiated and submitted 15 proposals to the Commercial Court for the initiation of bankruptcy proceedings, for a total debt amount of around 29,3 million euros.
"One request for the introduction of bankruptcy refers to the company Montenegro Airlines (MA), and the bankruptcy procedure was opened on April 28," Petričević added.
She, speaking in the role of UPC after the implementation of the Europe now program, with regard to the new calculation of health insurance, said that regardless of the way health insurance is organized, the costs of health care show a growing trend, which is a consequence of demographic changes - the aging of the population, but also technical technological achievements.
"With the implementation of the Europe Now program, in the part of the amendment to the Law on Contributions for Mandatory Social Insurance, contributions for health insurance at the expense of the employer and the expense of the employee are abolished, and in this way a reduction in the tax burden on work is ensured, and the state takes over funding from the budget" , Petričević said.
At the same time, this will also mean a reduction in public state revenues based on health insurance contributions. It is important to note that the Bismarck model provides full functionality only when the costs per insured person do not exceed the amount of the average contribution per insured person.
"By abolishing the joint obligation to pay contributions for health insurance, the financing of the health system, instead of the current Bismarck model of financing through a system of employee contributions on the one hand and free health care on the other, is taken over by the state through the financing of the entire population from its own budget revenues, the so-called Beveridge model. Therefore, the same scope of health care services is maintained, without prior payment of contributions", stated Petričević.
Therefore, UPC will make the necessary modifications to existing programs and procedures, which concern specific areas: abolition of the obligation to pay health insurance contributions at the expense of the employee and employer, the introduction of a non-taxable part of the salary, as well as a proportional reduction of income based on the tax surcharge.
"By implementing the program, budget revenues are increased based on the increase in the minimum wage and the introduction of progressive taxation of wages," Petričević reminded.
Petričević, answering the question of how they plan to solve the problem of tax debt collection, said that the debt of state-owned companies under the jurisdiction of the VPO sector at the beginning of December amounted to 30,95 million euros.
"Through communication with relevant ministries, as well as with the management of taxpayers, which we intensified especially in the fourth quarter of last year, we plan to establish the dynamics of payment of arrears of tax obligations, as well as newly created obligations with them, all in accordance with the legal possibilities," explained Petričević. .
Regarding the debt of private companies, especially those with a significant number of employees, through direct communication with the management, the UPC works intensively on establishing the dynamics of payment of obligations, so that the companies continue to carry out their work, pay salaries to employees, and at the same time settle their arrears. tax obligations.
"Only after exhausting all legal possibilities for delayed payment of tax arrears, UPC introduces compulsory collection measures", added Petričević.
In the plan of inspection supervision for this year, the UPC envisioned strengthening the partnership relationship with taxpayers as one of the most important activities in increasing tax discipline.
"We want to contribute to the tax culture and the uniform application of regulations by timely action, a professional approach and purposeful and reliable inspection supervision," said Petričević.
In response to the question of how much the state budget received from the reprogramming of tax claims, she said that since 2017 it has received a total of 91,73 million euros, while last year alone it received 13,11 million euros.
Speaking about the projects that the Administration will focus on this year, she said that UPC is committed to reaching European standards and fulfilling the conditions that the negotiation process entails.
"In this year, they will focus on several significant projects, among which the most important and complex is the Tax Administration Reform Project (RARP), which is financed by a loan from the World Bank," said Petričević.
The development goal of the project is to improve the effectiveness of the UPC's operational functions and reduce the costs of tax payers of legal entities when complying with tax obligations. The project will support the long-term vision of Montenegro, which is a tax administration with modernized business processes based on risk, which contribute to the efficient collection of taxes and contributions.
"Until the new management took office, and based on the mid-term review of the activities and the World Bank's mission to evaluate progress in the implementation project, in the period June - October, unsatisfactory progress was noted, except for the application of electronic fiscalization, while for other components , such as institutional development, business processes and services to taxpayers, it was noted that the initial functionalities have yet to be realized and that they are in a delay of less than two years", stated Petričević.
Bearing in mind the project implementation arrangements that were defined in the operational project manual in July 2017, when the project was approved, and in the function of project implementation, the administrative and advisory board of the project, the project implementation board, the project implementation unit, as well as five working group.
"After the integration of the three administrations, it will be necessary to revise the existing operational manual and consider the real need and possibility of expanding it," Petričević said.
The Tax Administration Reform project also includes technical support for changing the methodology and procedure for revenue collection, improvement of tax inspection and operational systems, supervision and technical assistance services, and an integrated revenue management system (IRMS).
"The implementation of the currently most important IT project - Support to the Customs Administration, which is related to the development of the national customs transit system of the NCTS and the procurement of equipment, is underway. The finalization of the project that will enable the implementation of the procedure of common transit of goods by submitting one transit declaration and one security at the customs authority of departure valid in 35 signatory countries of the Convention on Common Transit, i.e. during the entire transit of goods, is planned for this year," said Petričević.
This year, the Revenue and Customs Administration will be dedicated to the implementation of projects from the EUIF 2017 funds, i.e. the projects Implementation of the system of customs decisions at the national level and the twinning light project Preparation for the upgrade of TARICG to the latest version of EU TARIC and related ITMS subsystems.
When it comes to projects from the funds of IPA II 2018, the implementation of projects is expected this year - UPC support for the improvement of the customs information system (CIS), delivery and installation of a prefabricated Data Center with delivery and installation of equipment - ISO container and procurement of hardware for capacity expansion of the existing UPC server and storage system.
"Further continuation and intensification of activities is also expected in projects supporting the digitization of trade procedures - establishment of an electronic data processing system before the arrival of goods for shipments in maritime and postal traffic, which is implemented under the auspices of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany (GIZ) and "The implementation and use of the system/application for targeting shipments, which is carried out in accordance with the contract between UPC and the World Customs Organization," stated Petričević.
Petričević, answering the question about the application of the Law on fiscalization in the circulation of products and services and its benefits, said that fiscalization implies that all issued invoices, both cash and non-cash, are recorded in the UPC database.
"In this way, the UPC has the ability to promptly record transactions and analyze fiscal account data sent by taxpayers in real time. This is a very important improvement of business processes under the jurisdiction of UPC, from several aspects," said Petričević.
She stated that the digital transformation of the process of registration of taxpayers and registration of turnover was achieved, the possibility of reporting, analyzing and planning activities in accordance with the data collected in the electronic fiscalization system was provided, and the taxation process was improved for persons whose tax treatment depends on amount of realized taxable turnover.
"For citizens, the Personal Income Tax Act defines a turnover amount of 18 thousand euros for the last 12 months. However, if an individual who is taxed in the annual lump sum achieves a turnover greater than 18 thousand euros, he is obliged to submit a GPFL report and is taxed according to the actual income, which is ultimately also extremely significant from the point of view of recording the turnover through the fiscal service and tax treatment which a person has in accordance with the amount of recorded turnover", Petričević said.
According to her, the coverage of taxpayers who, in accordance with the legal framework, are obliged to record turnover during the performance of their activities, has been expanded.
"If we bear in mind that through the GPPFL application, income was reported, but not turnover, the application of the Law on fiscalization in the turnover of products and services significantly improved the process of recording turnover and ultimately adequate tax treatment and taxation of the taxpayer," said Petričević.
The indirect, positive effect, as she assessed, is also reflected through the improvement of the process of recording employees with those subject to fiscalization, because they are obliged to register everyone who issues invoices from electronic payment devices.
"The process of office control of taxpayers has been improved and the possibility of planning targeted controls from the Inspection Supervision, which in the end leads to better utilization of human resources engaged in the tasks of inspection supervision, and the retroactive posting of accounts in the accounting systems of fiscalization payers and aggressive planning of tax obligations has been prevented, as well as posting accounts/invoices with fictitious turnover that were not recorded in CIS UPC, which significantly reduced the risk of attempted tax fraud and tax evasion", explained Petričević.
She stated that the procedure for checking the fiscalization of invoices is enabled for all traffic participants and authorized officials of state administration bodies whose competence is to control the issuance of invoices.
From the point of view of services to taxpayers, a significant improvement is reflected through, as she stated, the process of registering taxpayers through digital transformation and reduction of the administrative burden.
"Using the web portal (self-service EFI portal-SEP), tax payers gain insight into the complete traffic that they have recorded in the UPC Central Information System," Petričević said.
In the event of data loss in your accounting system, you can easily find data on recorded traffic by searching the CIS UPC archive. Also, in a simple way, they can register with the tax authority, the opening, temporary closing and closure of business facilities in accordance with the real needs of their own business processes.
"The procedure for checking the fiscalization of accounts for all traffic participants, sellers/service providers and customers/users of services has been made possible through a QR code, which has significantly improved the control of several traffic participants, in real time, because it is possible to check all elements of the account", she specified. is Petričević.
She assessed that all these improvements result in the improvement of business processes within the jurisdiction of the UPC, services to taxpayers provided by the UPC and in the final improvement of tax discipline among taxpayers and the reduction of the presence of informal forms of economy.
Petričević, speaking about the merger of the gaming, tax and customs administrations, said that it was assessed that the newly established Revenue and Customs Administration will more comprehensively implement tax policy and customs tariff policy, bearing in mind the common goal defined through efficient revenue collection, with the use of simple, fair and effective procedures, by strengthening protection and security, in order to contribute to the general good of the citizens of Montenegro.
"The new organizational model envisages a more efficient collection of excise and tax revenue, which many products have, while the treatment of products that have input VAT paid at customs, but also sales VAT at the tax office, will be differentiated according to a clear line of competence. Increasing the efficiency of detecting customs and tax violations, as well as system security and responsibility for action, are just some of the positive effects of integration," Petričević said.
According to her, the integration of administrations will ensure a more effective implementation of tax and customs policy, and significant savings, as a fiscal effect of the synergy of business units.
"In the Development Directions of Montenegro from 2018 to last year, it was indicated that the optimization of the number of employees in the public sector is a key challenge, while the personnel capacities for successfully fulfilling obligations from EU integration must not be called into question. To that end, a methodology was established in which all relevant factors were considered, in order to determine the optimal number of employees in the Administration", said Petričević.
She said that this year, she will consider the possibility of forming a special organizational unit that will have the task of controlling the legality and quality of the performance of work duties from the UPC business domain and to analyze and check the property status and lifestyle and the achieved results of each employee in the Administration.
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