Monday, February 11 2019 15:19

ArmInfo. 92% of visitors to the single portal of legal acts of e- draft.am, where from January 23 to February 7 the draft amendments "On Amendments and Additions to the  RA Tax Code" were posted, spoke against the document submitted by the  Ministry of Finance of Armenia.

Thus, the respondents left more negative comments regarding the norm  of the document that puts a taboo on the implementation of activities  in the field of tax turnover regulation by representatives of  specialized activities, in particular, accountants, auditors, lawyers  and consultants.

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In the second place of this "rating" are those who oppose the  introduction of a flat income tax scale. As they note, the stated  goal - to remove revenues from the shadows does not correspond to the  essence of the document, because as a result of the approval of the  project, this measure will have the opposite effect.

The draft amendment to the current Tax Code from 2016 was posted on  e-draft.am in November 2018. At the same time, as later stated in the  Ministry of Finance of Armenia - the initiator of tax changes,  responding to the concerns of the expert community, the document was  finalized and resubmitted to the public on January 23.

In the new version, the authors of the document decided to raise the  threshold for microentrepreneurship to 24 million drams from January  1, 2020, from 20 million drams indicated in the previous text.  However, restrictions were introduced, which were not in the first  version. In particular, microenterprises will not be considered as  economic entities that carry out specialized activities, in  particular, accounting, legal profession, consulting. Microbusiness  will be exempt from all types of taxes other than income tax, which  will be 5 thousand drams.

At the same time, restrictions for them will be established also  within the framework of the turnover tax.  Thus, Armenia will  increase the non-taxable VAT threshold from turnover from the current  58.35 million ($ 120 thousand) to 115 million drams ($ 235 thousand),  but exclude from the list of potential beneficiaries tax payers of  representatives of specialized activities, in particular,  accountants, auditors, lawyers and consultants.

From September 1, 2019, Armenia plans to switch to a flat income  taxation system, which, regardless of the amount of wages, will be  set at 23%. Moreover, until 2023, the rate will gradually decrease to  20% - from January 1, 2020 - to 22%, from 2021 - to come to 21%, in  2022 - to 20.5%, and from 2023 - to 20%.  In parallel, the government  provides for a gradual return to the previous conditions of the  mandatory pension system before 2023. Thus, from January 2020, the  monthly mandatory payments on them by the working citizen will be  3.5% (from 6.5% with state co-financing) instead of 2.5% from the  size of the salary and 7.5% from July 1, 2018 state treasures.  Already in 2021, working citizens will monthly give 4.5% of their  salary to the All-Russia Regional Public Service, and from 2022 - all  5%. From 2020 to 2022 The government also offers equal rates of  income tax and dividend tax for citizens of Armenia and foreigners,  setting them also at the level of 23% (from 20% to 18% income tax and  from 10% to 5% dividend tax - Ed.). The Ministry of Finance also  proposes to fix that the pensions of residents of individuals  received from outside are not subject to taxation in Armenia.

As Deputy Minister of Finance of Armenia Arman Poghosyan said in an  interview with ArmInfo a month earlier, the finance ministry is  inclined to think that the project posted on the e-draft.am portal on  January 23 is final. "Back in November 2018, when the project was  presented in its previous form, it passed a long way of public and  departmental discussions, but the process cannot be endless.  Otherwise, the problems will remain unresolved. In our opinion, this  is the final stage. The document will stay on the portal until  February 7, after which it will be summarized and submitted to the  government, " Poghosyan said.