Amendments to the Tax Legislation in the Republic of Albania

Tax and Legislation Update for the Republic of Albania

Tax Appeals

The major change it is on the procedures of tax appeals. In case of the value to be appealed it is more than ALL 20 million, the case will be reviewed by the Commission for the Review of the Tax Appeals instead of Tax Appeals Directorate.

There is also a great news for international companies with laws and bylaws to be published in English as well as in Albanian, at the tax authorities web site.

Tax Auditing and Procedures

Companies will be given the opportunity to self-declare, out of normal datelines, transactions before the commencement of a tax audit.

Price list, are no longer obligatory, providing that the goods have a price tag. The same is true for services which do not have fixed prices, such as travel or transport agencies, which instead should publish hourly service rates.

Social and Health Contributions

New normative act that regulates the contribution as well as the timelines that self-employed sector made toward the social and health contribution as herein summarised:

All self-employed, unpaid family members over 16-year-old or wage earner should report their list of employees within two business days from an entity’s registration at the National Business Centre or Tax Administration.

Self – employed, with no employees or unpaid family members over 16 of age, should submit the payroll at least three days before the deadline for the submission of the social and health contributions declaration.

Social security contributions of the self-employed and their unpaid family members over 16 years old are calculated, based on their gross wage, in line with the calculations for all other employees. On the other hand, health contributions are calculated on the basis of twice the minimum wage in Albania.

VAT on buildings

The taxpayers can choose to apply VAT on the sales of buildings intended for commercial activities. The taxpayer cannot apply the VAT on individuals or non-registered taxpayers.

Customs

Customs are the only entity to authorise the technological card for industrial and agroindustry products. Excise tax reimbursement rates have been substituted by the respective rates contained in the technological card. The value of excise reimbursement should not exceed the 50%. The solar oil and mazut will be reimbursed up to 100% for utilisation not exceeding the technological card specifications. There is also an extension of the deadline for submission of the request for reimbursement to the tenth day of the month following the quarter in which the purchases were made.

The use of the fiscal stamps has been liberalised as the per operators can apply them any time, in the custom warehouse. While if the warehouse in under CCTV the custom officers do not necessary have to be present during the process.

Gaseous fuels have also been added to the list of imported fuels that must be placed in a fiscal storage warehouse. The wholesales have to report to the General Customs Directorate and Regional Customs Directorate with their inventory once a year and also a report of monthly sales and details of buyers, to the Regional Customs Directorate before the tenth day of the following month.

The Gambling Sector

The Gambling sector has been further regulated with various laws and by-laws regulating the implementation of law No 155/2015 entering in power in February 2016, such as: The Outline of the legal relationship between the Gambling Supervisory Authority and Customs agencies. The procedures to comply by in order to achieve authorisation from the Gambling Supervisory Authority. Procedures for import of the gambling devices and spare parts. Procedures for the disposals of the gambling devise. Licenses, fees and deadline for licensing for each category of gambling entity. Methodology for the calculation of the distance between gambling entities and educational and religious institutions. The deadline for the rules and regulation has been extended to December 2018.

The National Housing Agency has published the nationwide average cost of construction for 2016.

Swiss Federation Council and Government of Albania have signed the amendment for the avoidance of double taxation relating to taxes on income and capital.

The General Tax Directorate has established a free assistance call centre 0800 00 02 for taxpayers and citizens to enquire and been given expert advice on Tax administration.