Romania wants to cancel some taxes for which taxpayers sued the Tax Administration

Romania’s Government would like to cancel some taxes for certain copyright contracts, as well as for individuals registered for business who went to court against the country’s National Agency for Tax Administration ANAF. The state argues court costs would exceed the value of paid taxes, if the state won, according to Prime Minister Victor Ponta. So the Government is pondering a draft law that will cancel certain payment obligations for DDA contracts (copyright), PFA (authorized individuals), CASS (social health insurance contribution) and daily allowances for which taxpayers sued the ANAF. The draft will be on the Government meeting agenda on Wednesday, May 13. Should it pass, it would only cancel such taxes due by June 1, 2015, according to local Mediafax. Last week, ANAF stopped issuing decisions regulating social health insurance contributions for 2012 after some taxpayers were informed that the amounts they had to pay were higher than their revenues for the period. By current law, those who obtain revenues from interest, dividends or rents, regardless of their value, have to pay health insurance contributions calculated on a monthly basis which can’t be lower than the gross national minimum wage. In February this year, ANAF announced that it will issue decisions to cancel CASS payments previously imposed to individuals who weren’t supposed to make these payments. Also, those who already paid the money can ask for a refund. The Government decided this procedure through a draft law after, in early-2015, thousands of children who got their allowances on cards received payment notifications from ANAF for CASS contributions for 2012. Some of the children who received such notifications were aged under 10. Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com