Azernews.Az

By Aynur Jafarova

While choosing taxpayers for concluding partnership agreements Azerbaijan's Ministry of Taxes will prefer the persons conducting non-cash purchase and sale transactions, director of the General Directorate for Tax Policy and Strategic Studies of the ministry, Akif Musayev, told Trend news agency on October 12.

According to the rules on concluding relevant agreements, approved by the Cabinet of Ministers, the persons using certified software during the implementation of accounting, VAT payers, as well as loan and insurance organizations, and persons who comprehensively and timely implemented their obligations during a tax year will gain privileges as well, Musayev said.

Musayev said applications for the conclusion of partnership agreements are a voluntary right of each taxpayer. However, the taxation bodies under certain circumstances would decline concluding them on the basis of rules. The reasons for declining include the taxpayer's outstanding obligation before the state budget, absence of a final decision on supervision measures related to the activity of the taxpayer, etc.

Musayev believes that the taxpayers themselves are interested in concluding such agreements.

"A tax partnership agreement will allow essentially reducing the risks related to the avoidance of taxation and minimizing additional financial spending. Furthermore, such agreements will allow keeping possible arguable cases in interactions between the taxpayers and taxation bodies to a minimum, as well as reducing the administrative expenditure of both sides on their elimination," Musayev said.

The Ministry of Taxes will sign the first partnership agreements with entrepreneurs this year. The main purpose of introducing the partnership agreements is to strengthen mutual trust between tax bodies and entrepreneurs, as well as to minimize the number of audits of taxpayers. This is being done with the purpose to increase accuracy of tax calculations and ensure better risk management.

Given that an increase in the volume of non-cash payments is one of the main sources of a significant expansion of the taxable base, Azerbaijan intends to reach the level of leading European countries in this regard in the near future.