DIA TAYTA: It is possible for those who have been fined for not issuing receipts to seek a crushing reduction!

But this can (for the time being) only be done through the courts by exercising the appropriate legal remedies before the competent Courts.

THE ISSUE:

As it is known, especially under the regime of Law 2523/1997, fines for violations of the Code of a particularly high amount were provided for, which had the character of a penalty, did not represent an independent loss to the State in terms of tax loss and unilaterally aimed at the damnation of the tax offender. In addition to these, acts were normally imposed which calculated the amount of tax foregone together with fines and surcharges on it. Under the provisions of Law 2523/1997, excessive fines amounting to tens of millions of euros have been imposed, but, as is well known, the vast majority of them remain unpaid.

Law 4174/2013 brought about a first rationalization of the level of the relevant penalties provided for in the Code, which reduced the fines imposed in particular for the issue/receipt of fictitious data and the non-issuance/inaccurate issue, with the exception of the case of non-issuance of several small receipts, where for the tax years 2014 and part of the tax year 2015, there are a number of cases that have been imposed under the then applicable article 54 para. i Law 4174/2013, fines for not issuing receipts with a ceiling of 30,000 euros, as opposed to Law 2523/1997 where the prescribed ceiling was 12,000 or 18,000 depending on the category of books kept.

There are cases of tax audits for the tax year 2014, e.g. a doctor who kept simple books, for not issuing a document for prescription or referral examinations, with an attributed withheld material, per unissued document the amount of 10 euros and total alleged withheld material 1.200euros (ie non-issuance of 120 receipts) where there the prescribed sanction is 120 * 250 euros each violation, ie a total fine of 30,000 euros!

The same violation if it was found to have been committed until 31-12-2013, a maximum fine of 12,000 euros would be imposed (i.e. a maximum fine of 15 times the fine base for each violation of non-issuance, which was 800 euros for non-issuance/1200 euros for double-entry books).

This was followed by Law 4337/2015 which mostly abolished the independent fines for issuing/receiving fictitious and non-issuance of receipts from the time of its entry into force, while it included transitional provisions for violations committed before the time of its application, which prohibited the retroactive application of the milder framework, i.e. the non-application of independent fines.

Regarding the non-issuance of receipts with low hidden value, Law 4337/2015, through its transitional provisions, has maintained a particular paradox. In the example mentioned above with the doctor, for violations committed until 31-12-2013, it provided that now 1/3 of the amount of the fine provided for under Law 2523/1997, i.e. a total fine of 4,000 euros, will be imposed at the time of detection.

On the contrary, for an infringement referring to the year 2014 and for part of the year 2015, the fine of 30.000 is still imposed!!

The Council of State's decision 2319/2021 addressed the issue of fines related to the receipt of fictitious data, which have been imposed before the entry into force of Law 4337/2015 and it was held that the beneficial provisions of this law, which abolished the imposition of fines independently, imposed now only a general violation fine for improper bookkeeping and data of 2,500 euros, must apply retroactively, being considered unconstitutional any contrary transitional provision of the relevant law.

By analogy, although the aforementioned decision did not rule on the issue of non-issuance of tax evidence, it is obvious that the same should apply to cases of non-issuance of evidence which have been imposed before the entry into force of Law 4337/2015.

Therefore, it is possible for those who have been fined for not issuing receipts, both for the aforementioned example of 30,000 euros and for any other fine for not issuing receipts, to seek the overwhelming reduction of the relevant fines to the amount of 2,500 euros!

But this can only be done, for the time being, through the exercise of appropriate legal remedies before the competent Courts.