Representatives of the State Tax Service of Ukraine and Ukrainian Oil & Gas Association discussed how to improve transparency of excisable market, particularly the turnover of fuel. According to the First Deputy Chairman of the STS Natalia Ruban, today the STS is tightening control over activities of economic entities on the fuel market.
Tax audit units conducted 753 actual audits of gas stations (or approximately each tenth gas station) in 2021, in order to prevent and detect legislative violations committed by the taxpayers involved in the fuel trade. Specifically, 372 million UAH of fines (financial) sanctions were applied to economic entities. Audits of individual traders are also provided in the schedule of documentary scheduled audits of taxpayers for 2021.
According to Natalia Ruban, tax specialists accurately check facts of violations received by the STS from the Association and other agencies, but due to the moratorium on audits the STS cannot use a full range of resources required for this.
At the same time, in her opinion, the situation with unfair competition on the market cannot be only solved by control measures.
“Tax service is a service body that administers taxes and we strive to create such rules for market’s transparency. It is not possible to stop movement of shadow products only by audits, as systemic changes are needed, first of all, in legislation. And we have to work on this together with all interested institutions” – emphasized First Deputy Chairman of the STS.
In turn, the President of “Ukrainian Oil & Gas Association” Nelya Pryvalova noted that the Association is ready to join this work together with the Tax service and provide expert assistance to establish fair rules of the game on the fuel market and avoid distorted competition.
Representatives of the STS noted assistance of Association in exposing violations, particularly regarding the operation of gas stations and refineries that operate in violation of applicable law.
According to Natalia Ruban, one of the ways to solve this situation is to improve a system of automatic administration of excisable products, on which the STS is currently actively working on.
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