Abolished tax returns - two counters less for citizens
There are around 120,000 real estate purchases and inheritance procedures registered in Serbia a year, and the abolishment of tax returns in these situations will eliminate two counters and cut the expenses for citizens and businesses by at least 6.5 million euros in the following four years, it is estimated by the project „Introducing One Stop Shop for Real Estate Property Registration in Serbia“, being implemented by NALED and PwC Serbia with the support of UK Government's Good Governance Fund, which initiated their abolishment.
The Amendments to the Law on Property Taxes adopted last week by the National Parliament, starting from 1 January, the obligation of filing tax returns for property tax, absolute transfer of rights tax and inheritance and gift tax when signing an agreement on real estate purchase or undergoing inheritance proceeding, will be abolished. This means that the citizens and businesses will no longer have a reason to visit the counters of tax authorities to file tax returns.
Through Good Governance Fund, the British Embassy in Belgrade supported the abolishment of the obligation to file tax returns, within the project supporting the reforms in the field of real estate purchase and registration in the Cadaster, with approximately one million euros, with the aim of providing support to the key reforms that ease the lives of citizens. This way, the UK also supports the environment protection, as each of these tax returns involves two to four papers, so their elimination will also mean reduction by at least 400,000 pieces of paper a year.
NALED Policy Director Jelena Bojović said that the public notaries will enter the data about real estate purchase or inheritance into their electronic system, and the data from this system will be available to the Tax Administration and local tax authorities, which will determine the amount of tax ex officio.
- Over the previous year, NALED and PwC Serbia have cooperated with the Prime Minister's Cabinet, Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Finance, Office for IT and E-Government, City of Belgrade, public notaries, Republic Geodetic Authority and Tax Administration, on having the tax returns eliminated and linking four IT systems to exchange data. Starting from 1 January, the public notaries will send data to tax authorities, which means even less counters for citizens to visit - said Bojović.
During the first phase of the reform which was initiated in July 2018, the obligation of visiting the Cadaster has been eliminated as the public notary will send the necessary documents ex officio through the eCounter system. In the second phase, starting from January 2020, the public notary will replace another two counters - the Tax Administration and local tax authority. All information about the simplified procedure can be found at www.upisnepokretnosti.rs.
