site.btaFinance Minister: No Burden for Traders and Businesses If Their Software Meets Statutory Requirements

There will be no burden on traders and businesses if the software they use complies with the legally established requirements, Finance Minister Temenuzhka Petkova told journalists after the Council of Ministers meeting on Wednesday.

“What our colleagues from Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) are doing leads me to believe they have reservations about combating the grey economy, and this discourages all those who want to be loyal to the fiscal system,” Petkova said. Earlier in the day, Martin Dimitrov of Yes, Bulgaria, part of the Continue the Change – Democratic Bulgaria parliamentary group, called at a briefing for the Finance Ministry to amend next year’s State Budget and drop the requirement for businesses to use sales management software in retail outlets. 

Petkova said the CC-DB group was spreading false and inaccurate claims, the first being that the required software is one that the National Revenue Agency (NRA) will develop and deploy. “The NRA will not produce or implement any software, and this will not cost Bulgarian businesses any resources,” she said. She recalled that there are already certain requirements for revenue management systems in retail outlets, and these systems must meet statutory criteria. These requirements are not changing, she added.

The legal requirement applies only to software producers and distributors, who must ensure that their products meet the ordinance’s standards, Petkova said.

Reintroducing the software requirement is part of the NRA’s oversight activities, which have uncovered numerous cases of non-compliant software being used in retail outlets, creating conditions for data manipulation and losses to the Treasury in VAT and other taxes, she added. This necessitates the introduction of the sales management software in retail outlets and the requirement that producers and distributors obtain NRA approval.

Currently, more than 6,000 retail outlets use software approved by the NRA, Petkova said.