Owners of cafes and restaurants claim that higher VAT levels are hurting their business. Tax Administration data shows otherwise.
In the first four months of this year, the amount of fiscalized receipts increased by 11.3 percent compared to the same period last year, to almost four billion kuna, while the number of receipts fell by 1.2 percent, to 106.6 million, according to information from the Tax Administration, reports 24sata.hr on May 12, 2017.
These are data from the Tax Administration’s fiscalization system related to hospitality services, which include provision of accommodation and catering services. The Tax Administration points out that the fall in the number of issued invoices for the first four months of the year suggests there were more receipts being issued in fewer establishments.
Despite the lower number of receipts issued, the data show a double-digit increase in the total amount on fiscal receipts. This means there has been an increase in turnover in the hospitality industry, which is contrary to the claims coming from owners who say that their turnover has dropped significantly due to the increase in VAT rate from 13 to 25 percent at the beginning of this year.
The Tax Administration's fiscalization system is currently the only official statistical indicator of turnover in the hospitality industry, since the Central Bureau of Statistics has not been tracking data on turnover in the hospitality industry since 2010.
Regarding the data from the fiscalization system, the Tax Administration points out that the data is being monitored according to the taxpayer's seat, which means, for example, that if a chain has branches throughout Croatia and has its headquarters in Zagreb, the turnover of all branch offices in the fiscalization system is recorded as taking place in Zagreb, and not in the counties where it was actually realized. “The tracking of turnover by individual branches will be enabled by the fiscalization system in the second half of this year, according to new legal provisions,” announced the Tax Administration.
The Tax Administration has provided data for the first four months of this year separately for the segment of accommodation and for the segment of preparation and serving of food and beverages.
According to the data, in the segment of accommodation services, the amount of fiscalized receipts has reached 913.5 million kuna. This is an increase of 22.2 percent compared to last year. In the segment of food and beverage preparation and serving, the amount of fiscalized receipts was nearly 3 billion kuna, or 8.3 percent higher than in 2016.
The total amount of fiscalized receipts in the catering industry in 2016 exceeded 21.2 billion kuna.
