Last week, the company that offers accommodation abroad to individuals through the digital platform called Airbnb, informed its affiliates that it sent their information to the Superintendence of Tax Administration (SAT) of Guatemala, at the request of this institution.
The entity confirmed this point this morning, explaining that there are 2,659 taxpayers who are dedicated to providing rental services for 7,242 different properties, so in the years 2021 and 2022 they were rented on 254,453 occasions. .
Consequently, it was detected that these services represented income for the hosts of US$109 million, that is, regarding Q866 million, according to Marco Livio Díaz, superintendent of Tax Administration.
Based on this data and the verification of compliance or non-compliance with payments, it was estimated that the minimum collection is calculated at Q185 million, to which adding the fines and interest, reaches Q300 million.
The request to the tax authority of Ireland, the host country of said platform, was made based on decree 9-2017 that contains the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters and based on article 98 of the Tax Code.
Call to regularize
The SAT called on those who provide these services and are not adequately declaring and paying their taxes to regularize their situation voluntarily or they will be summoned and subsequently reported. To do this, it is recommended to comply with the following:
- Affiliate with the ISR and VAT Regime, as applicable.
- Update your registration to the VAT and ISR regime, according to your income.
- Declare the corresponding taxes.
- Issue invoices for the temporary rental service.
How to proceed
The Mayor of Inspection, Óscar Hernández, explains the steps that the tax entity will take to recover what was defrauded:
- The SAT is making a public call to taxpayers or those who must declare taxes on that income, to meet the information requirements of the entity so that they voluntarily pay the corresponding taxes, in accordance with the current regime or in which they are going to register.
- If you do not comply with the request, you will be notified in writing. This has other consequences and the case can even reach coercive economic courts because the SAT already has the information on a certain basis and there is no doubt regarding the taxes owed to the State.
- If there is no positive response, the SAT will appoint an audit so that the amount to be paid is calculated and collected.
- If they do not pay, the next step is to seize properties and bank accounts.
- If they do not appear and do not want to receive the notifications, they can be accused of the crime of resisting supervisory action, which carries prison sentences.
Other subterfuges
It was also indicated that, sometimes, people ask for cash payments supposedly so that there is no evidence, however, banking information is also requested where income is detected and data is tracked.
Hernández added that “it doesn’t matter if it was paid in cash or trying to evade payment through a credit card, which might be an easier way to locate them, since all the payments that were made have also been detected.”
He announced that the investigation of other digital media that are not on this specific platform will continue.
He also called to pay what corresponds to 2023 and 2024 because these are data that have already been requested from the Irish authorities.
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