Small Businesses Protest against New VAT Threshold

TIRANA, April 10

Small businesses in the Albanian capital city and all over the country closed their shops for one hour on Tuesday in protest against the government decision for lowering the Value Added Tax (VAT) threshold. Sellers at the Medrese, Cam and Electric Appliances markets in Tirana joined the protests held between 11:00 and 12:00 hours and called by the Small Business Association.
Small businesses have been charged VAT starting April 1st as the compulsory registration threshold was lowered from Lek five million to Lek two million.
On the other hand, Minister of Finance and Economy Arben Ahmetaj that the application of the scheme that charges VAT to small businesses is a key step in the fight against informality. According to him, the reform doesn’t aim at generating revenue from small businesses.
“There will be no fines for small businesses that make mistake in their declarations until December 31, 2018,” Ahmetaj said.
Moreover, he added that this is a common economic reform.
The small businesses that will be charged VAT are expected to make a declaration per quarter of the fiscal year. The opposition supported the protest but in a few cases, the opposition lawmakers were asked by the sellers to leave the protest.
News Source: TCh

Photo Credit: A. Kraja