Since 2014, the Greek tax administration has been equipped with the unique privilege of confirming, in advance, after the completion of the tax audit and with only the notification of the relevant acts to the auditee - irrespective of any appeal - the 100% of the taxes, interest and fines charged.

This is a unique privilege because, unlike in private disputes where, in order to be enforceable, a claim must be final - i.e. it must have been assessed by two levels of jurisdiction in principle - the amounts unilaterally charged by the tax administration enjoy immediate enforceability.

In particular, after the expiry of the statutory time limit for their payment - i.e. 30 days from their notification without any legal assessment - they become due.

The reasons for this unique privilege are linked in particular to the principle of legality which normally governs the administration, whose acts enjoy a 'presumption of correctness' from the day they are adopted until they are revoked or annulled by the competent court.

Therefore, as issued by the administration which - in principle "does not err" - constitute a valid title for the immediate pursuit of recovery.

We recall that this "architecture" of tax debts has existed over time with one notable difference:

The legislator initially - recognizing both the possibility that the tax administration might make a mistake and the time needed to adjudicate a tax appeal which acknowledges the error - had (wisely) established a mechanism for pre-certification by means of an appeal.

However, the relevant amount of attestation has undergone successive legislative changes, resulting in the rate of 10% before attestation (which was in force since 2004 under Law 3296/2004, which even reduced it from the 20% already in force at that time), to increase to 25% under Law 3842/2010, then to 50% under Law 3943/2011 to reach 100%, as of 1-1-2014, with the adoption and entry into force of the Code of Tax Procedure.

The alleged objective of the above-mentioned amendments is the pressure of the memoranda and the decongestion of the courts by preventing the exercise of bogus appeals, with the sole aim of delaying certification.

But the true aim was and is to serve the cash interest of the public.

In addition, these rates before certification and finally full certification were not accompanied by a corresponding improvement in the time of justice, with the result that the governed, with all the damage this entails, is held hostage for years for the 100% of these debts.

Debts from which - as will be explained - no form of provisional judicial protection can be fully discharged except by their annulment by the competent court.

Today, therefore, a taxpayer who is charged with tax and penalty acts, even if he or she brings an appeal against them, is not exempted from the obligation to pay the entire debt.

What options are therefore available by which the taxpayer could legally avoid the immediate payment (part or all) of the disputed debts?

Ι. By the Tax Procedure Code itself, the appellant taxpayer, in the event of an appeal (initially an appeal and then a judicial appeal), is given the option of paying the 50% of the disputed amounts of taxes and penalties as a condition for suspending the collection of the remaining 50% of such taxes and penalties.

Attention of the collection and not of the attestation!

The payment of the amount is made once at the time of the lodging of the appeal or -now- by instalment, when the amount due is completed through the instalments paid 50%.

We note that this suspension is granted only in the event of voluntary payment by the petitioning taxpayer of the 50% and not if the State - on its own initiative following, for example, a garnishment or offset - happens to collect the 50% of the disputed debt.

Another option available to the taxpayer -also under the Code of Tax Procedure- is the submission, together with the appeal -or independently- of a request for suspension of the payment of the 50% of the imputed tax as a condition for the suspension of the collection of the remaining 50%.

The same right is also granted before the Administrative Courts in the event of rejection of the aforementioned appeal.

Unfortunately, our experience is that at the level of the appeal procedure of the ADA's BADC, the request is rarely accepted!

This highlights the serious lack of real interim judicial protection for the four months that these proceedings have been pending.

We note for the umpteenth time that the 50%'s payment (or suspension) of the amounts assessed and disputed is not a condition of the admissibility of the appeal - and subsequently the judicial review.

It is only a precondition for not seeking collection by the State of the other 50% of the imputed amounts, which, however, as confirmed, continue to bear interest from the time of notification of the imputation acts on which they are based.

II. The aforementioned gap in judicial protection, especially for the four months that the case is pending before the BPA, can be filled by the remedy of an opposition before the competent administrative court.

In particular, in recent years there has been a wealth of administrative case law which recognises that while a tax case is pending before the BCC (appeal procedure), the tax authority has the right to collect taxes and fines on the basis of an audit, but is not entitled to take additional administrative enforcement measures (seizure of accounts, rent, etc.).

Moreover, it has been held that a prerequisite for enforcement measures to be taken by the tax authority is the prior sending of an individual notice, which constitutes the first pre-seizure action. It is often observed that the tax authorities send individual notices of debt while the case is still pending before the BTI or even proceed directly to seizures without even sending the aforementioned notice.

In such cases, the applicant can and should enjoy judicial protection by filing an opposition and a request for suspension before the administrative courts by directly appealing against the individual notice or seizure imposed on him.

III. Finally, in addition to the above-mentioned possibilities, the taxpayer has the opportunity to settle his debts in up to 48 installments based on Law 4152/2013 or alternatively up to 240 installments through the out-of-court debt settlement mechanism of Law 4738/2020 if the amounts charged exceed 10,000 euros.