Azerbaijan records cut in tax arrears

Azerbaijan has started to use advanced practices of informing taxpayers who have tax arrears to ensure their payment, the Azerbaijani Ministry of Taxes reported today.

"As experience of informing taxpayers, having arrears, of a number of developed countries such as Australia, Canada, U.S. and Ireland,shows, joint study of their arrears by tax bodies officers and taxpayers to encourage volunteer payment without taking measures of compulsion, i.e. practice of face-to-face meetings, is widely used," the statement says.

According to the information, Azerbaijan started to introduce this system from August, 2010. It aims at informing taxpayers on measures which will be taken by the tax bodies in case of non-payment of arrears.

"Meetings were held from August, 2010 and 25,289 tax payers were informed. As a result of these measures 79.9 per cent of them paid off voluntarily their arrears at total amount of 19 million manat," the statement says.

Also as a result of granting powers to bodies on recovering tax arrears on conducting operative control, as well as improvement of organization of inventory, organization of joint work with law enforcement officers, decrease of the total amount of arrears by 19.7 per cent compared to Jan., 2011 was ensured.


/Trend/