Moldovan state fiscal service to resume controls concerning practicing unregistered labour, wages "in envelopes"

Chisinau, 28 September /MOLDPRES/ - The State Fiscal Service (SFS) has informed that, following the finishing of the moratorium on state controls on 1 October, it would resume the fiscal controls. The tax payers having a high risk in this respect will be subjected to verifications as a priority.      

A SFS press release reads that, in the process of planning and carrying out fiscal controls for the next periods, the State Fiscal Service preponderantly will take into account the fiscal bahaviour and the level of voluntary compliance of tax payers with the observance of the fiscal legislation. The foremost goal of the control activities set for the next period represents the discovering and sanctioning of the practice of unregistered labour and payment of salaries “in envelopes.”

Starting from 1 April 2016, the government established a moratorium on state control for a three-month period, and extended the latter till 30 September 2016 on 1 July 2016.  

The phenomenon of the salary “in envelopes” affected the economy and brings big damages both to the budget and the employee. According to estimations of research institutions, to which the National Trade Unions Confederation has earlier referred, the sum of the wages paid “in envelopes” amounts to almost 15.5 billion lei or about 50 per cent of the annual labour remuneration fund. The informal employment, and especially the unregistered labour and salaries “in envelopes,” has become a widely discussed subject in Moldova starting from the summer of 2011, when an action plan on minimizing the practice of paying salaries “in envelopes” and unregistered labour was approved.     

Under a draft on amendment of the legislation in force, approved by the government in last June, the fines for the payment of salaries “in envelopes” will be increased up to 25,000 lei for private people and 75,000 lei for legal entities.

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor L. Alcaza)