“Tiffany” – the SPO suspects that underwear and purses were bought through a company

The exhibits provide space for justified suspicion that between the tax years of 2008 and 2014, the suspect, as a director of the given legal entities, reduced the base for calculating the income tax, abused the right of tax allowances to value added tax and didn’t report personal incomes, which must be reported pursuant to the Law on Personal Income Tax

In the press conference from 23 March 2017, the Special Prosecution Office (SPO) announced that it has initiated a new investigation code-named “Tiffany”. It’s about tax evasion by a physical entity who is owner and director of “Smart centar DOOEL export import Skopje” and the “Smart” agency. According to the SPO, between 2008 and 2014, the suspect gave false data about the facts related to tax calculations, so she and the legal entities could evade the payment of taxes.

The prosecutor Fatime Fetai announced that this investigation covers

the perpetration of one extended crime – Tax evasion from Article 279 Paragraph 2 relating to Paragraph 1 of the Criminal Code, and there is justified suspicion that the crime has been committed by a physical entity as an owner, director and sole authorized signer of the account of Communications and Consulting Company Smart Centar DOOEL export import Skopje and sole authorized signer of the account of Marketing and Propaganda Company Smart Group DOOEL Skopje.

Namely, the evidence provide space for justified suspicion that for the years 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the suspect and her legal entities intended to partially evade the payment of taxes by reporting false data in the bookkeeping records, final accounts and in the tax declaration about the facts that affect the amount of tax liabilities they were obliged to pay. By doing so, the aforementioned legal entities evaded to pay their tax liabilities in the significant amount of 2.314.463 denar or 37.634 euro, whereas the suspect evaded to pay her tax liabilities in the significant amount of 1.040.840 denar or 16.924 euro.

The exhibits provide space for justified suspicion that between the tax years of 2008 and 2014, the suspect, as a director of the given legal entities, reduced the base for calculating the income tax, abused the right of tax allowances to value added tax and didn’t report personal incomes, which must be reported pursuant to the Law on Personal Income Tax.

Namely, there is justified suspicion that the suspect used the legal entities as a disguise, and the procurement of commodities and services for her own were reported as procurement as procurements for the legal entities, although they didn’t have employees to use the procured equipment.

Such resources were reported in the books as basic resources, equipment and running costs, and by doing so she reduced the base for calculating the income tax. When it comes to these expenditures, which are not recognized by the law, because they weren’t used for the actual activity of the companies, but for personal needs, the suspect abused the right of tax allowance of the income VAT and reduced that liability as well.

The evidence also show that the amount paid for commodities and received services, which were actually used for personal needs and according to the Law on Personal Income Tax they are her personal incomes, wasn’t reported in the annual tax report sheet and by not reporting she evaded such tax liability as well.

The entire press conference is available here, and the media reports related to this event are available here (in Macedonian).

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