The Food and Economic Security Authority (ASAE) detected at least 174 situations of non-compliance with VAT Zero since its application in May last year, pointing out that the majority were resolved immediately.
«We are following this monitoring and of the 174 crime cases, 88 were delegated to ASAE», stated the inspector general of the authority Luís Lourenço, in a hearing at the Economy, Public Works, Planning and Housing Commission, who added that these are data provisional and relating to inspections of more than 2000 economic operators.
According to Luís Lourenço, these are criminal processes that “have continuity”.
Even so, he pointed out that in terms of liability, national legislation means that it is “not always” easy to prove the liability of legal entities.
«Who put the price on the shelf? Was it the legal person or was it the employee who did it?”, asked the person in charge, who added that “most of them, not to be exaggerated, were corrected at the moment they were detected by ASAE inspectors on the part of economic operators”.
The prompt correction did not imply, however, «that there was no preparation of the corresponding criminal process», he explained.
ASAE's analysis concluded that the implementation of the Zero VAT measure, which began in May, "had its effect, with an effective reduction of more than 6%" in the authority's monitoring.
Luís Lourenço detailed that during the analysis there were variations that could be associated with seasonal issues or product shortages, but that the measure “had an effect in terms of monitoring and was monitored weekly with variations always below, in what was defined, of 6%».
The zero VAT basket ends on January 4th (after being subject to two extensions), an end that has been contested by consumers, trade associations and distribution companies and which suggests an increase in the prices of those products – the majority of which are normally subject to a 6% rate of this tax.
Luís Lourenço said he does not know how the prices of the 46 products covered by this basket will react to the reinstatement of this tax.
«Prices are free, the application of prices is not regulated by law, so what we can detect here are situations in terms of the law», he added, pointing out that, in the last week, there was a stabilization of prices and not «a pre-price increase”.
The ASAE inspector general also expressed concern about how to analyze the impact of profit margins, saying that there is no way “to transpose this into a spreadsheet”.
«There is transport, there is the worker, from the field to the sale and the plate. This entire chain has a value", he pointed out, saying that illegitimate profit in legislation "is a very subjective concept".
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