Monday, April 8 2019 13:35

ArmInfo. The application of new excise tax rates on automobile gas will not lead to an increase in tax liabilities and an increase in gas fuel prices. This was stated  on April 8 at an extraordinary meeting of the parliament by RA Deputy  Minister of Finance Arman Poghosyan, who presented amendments to the  Tax Code of the RA in the first reading.

As the Deputy Minister noted, the proposed changes, first of all, are  aimed at protecting the rights of almost 510 thousand beneficiaries.  It is proposed, in particular, to sell compressed gas not by volume,  but by weight, that is, not in cubic meters, but in kilograms. In  this regard, the unit of measure coefficient is introduced, which  will be 0.717 kilograms per 1 cubic meter gas engine fuel.

And based on this formula, the cost of one ton of compressed gas will  be approximately 34867 drams instead of 25 thousand at present. There  were two ways to resolve the issue - either to round the rate to 35  thousand drams, which would increase the tax burden, or, conversely,  reduce them to 34 thousand drams, which was done. As expected, the  law will come into force on May 1 of this year. The Deputy Minister  ruled out the possibility of an unreasonable price increase, noting  that gas filling stations would not have to introduce new equipment,  since the fuel is purchased from Gazprom Armenia in terms of volume,  not weight.

He also pointed out the need to use cash registers at gas stations.  As previously noted by the head of the inspection body for market  monitoring Armen Kotolyan, the recent trend of rising prices for  compressed gas is a manifestation of abuse. The whole problem, he  continued, rests on the density of gas, which must be monitored  daily. In recent years, the gas density was 7.1, however, already for  2-3 months, Gazprom Armenia has been providing automobile gas with a  density of 7.9. The economic entities were supposed to make the  appropriate changes to their programs, but they did not. As a result,  consumers paid more money.  All gas stations have been instructed to  implement gas density assessment programs as soon as possible and  track them daily.

Gas density is one of its most important characteristics. Speaking  about the density of a gas, one usually means its density under  normal conditions (i.e., at a temperature of zero degrees and a  pressure of 760 mm Hg). In addition, they often use the relative  density of a gas, by which they mean the ratio of the density of a  given gas to the density of air under the same conditions. The  relative density of the gas does not depend on the conditions in  which it is located, since, according to the laws of the gas state,  the volumes of all gases change with changes in pressure and  temperature equally.