09 Acts of Tax Evasion May Be Subject to Imprisonment for Up to 07 Years

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SYSTEM OF TAX LEGAL DOCUMENTS IN FORCE IN 2019

Pursuant to the provisions of Article 200 Criminal Code 2015 and Point a Clause 47 Article 1 Law amending the Criminal Code 2017 on Tax Evasion Offenses, individuals committing any of the following 09 acts of tax evasion involving amounts ranging from 100,000,000 VND to less than 300,000,000 VND, or amounts under 100,000,000 VND but have been administratively sanctioned for tax evasion or have been convicted of this crime, or one of the crimes stipulated in Articles 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 202, 250, 251, 253, 254, 304, 305, 306, 309, and 311 of the Criminal Code 2015, not yet having their criminal records expunged, will be fined from 100,000,000 VND to 500,000,000 VND or face imprisonment from 03 months to 01 year:

- Failure to submit taxpayer registration documents; failure to submit tax declaration documents; submitting tax declaration documents 90 days past the deadline for submitting tax declaration documents or the extended submission deadline as prescribed by law;

- Failing to record in accounting books the revenues related to determining the amount of tax payable;

- Failing to issue invoices when selling goods or services or recording the value on sales invoices lower than the actual payment value of the goods or services sold;

- Using illegal invoices and documents to account for input goods and materials in tax-related activities, reducing the tax payable amount, or increasing the tax-exempt, tax-reduced amount, or increasing the deductible tax amount, tax refund amount;

- Using other illegal documents and papers to incorrectly determine the amount of tax payable or tax refund amount;

- Wrongly declaring exported or imported goods without supplementing tax declaration documents after the goods have been cleared;

- Intentionally failing to declare or wrongly declaring taxes on exported or imported goods;

- Conspiring with senders to import goods;

- Using tax-exempt goods, duty-free goods incorrectly without reporting the purpose change to tax authorities.

Particularly, the imprisonment penalty will range from 02 years to 07 years or a fine between 1,500,000,000 VND and 4,500,000,000 VND if the tax evasion amount is from 1,000,000,000 VND or more.

Moreover, offenders may also be prohibited from holding positions, practicing professions, or performing certain jobs from 01 year to 05 years, or parts or all of their assets may be confiscated.

For legal entities, committing the crime of Tax Evasion following any of the above 09 acts can be fined up to 10,000,000,000 VND or have their operations suspended for 06 months to 03 years.

Furthermore, a legal entity committing tax evasion may also be prohibited from doing business, operational activities in certain fields, or raising capital from 01 year to 03 years.

More severely, a legal entity may face permanent operational suspension if the tax evasion act causes harm or has the potential to cause significant harm to the lives of many people, causes environmental incidents, or adversely affects security, order, and social safety, and is unable to remedy the consequences caused.

- Nguyen Trinh -

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