Prepared by Francesco Pizzo and Federica Panzeri
The 2020 budget law (n. 160/2019) introduced two new consumption taxes under the responsibility of the Customs and Monopolies Authority: the tax on the consumption of plastic products with single use or ” MACSI ”(known as the“ Plastic Tax ”) and the tax on the consumption of sweetened beverages (known as the“ Sugar Tax ”).
We hereby provide first comments on the changes to the aforementioned taxes envisaged by the 2021 budget law (in the draft version as of November 14, 2020), referring to our previous Newsalerts of November 11, 2019 and January 16, 2020 for what is not subject to modification.
With reference to the Plastic Tax, on a substantial level it should be better fixed the concept of “semi-finished Macsi” explicitly including preforms among these.
In addition, it should be provided that taxable payers include also persons who sell Macsi produced by third parties on their behalf.
With reference to the tax obligations, the quarterly threshold under which taxable payers are exempted from declaration and payment should be increased from 10 to 25 Euro.
A general mitigation of the administrative penalties that can be imposed in the event of missing or late payment and for formal violations has been envisaged.
It is still up to the Customs and Monopolies Authority to adopt the relevant implementing provisions. In this respect, there are two new points that should be highlighted, namely: the possibility of determining, also on a forfeit basis, the quantities of Macsi containing other goods introduced into the territory of the State; the provision of additional data to be quoted in the sale / purchase invoices of Macsi for tax purposes.
It will be necessary to wait for the implementing acts to better understand the scope of the above new provisions (to the extent that they will be confirmed in the final version of the budget law for 2021).
Finally, the entry into force of the tax should be deferred from 1 January to 1 July 2021.
The amendments envisaged for the Sugar Tax are quite similar although more limited.
From a substantial point of view, also in this case the taxable payer should include those on whose behalf the drinks are obtained by a manufacturer or by a conditioner. Consistently, the tax point should arise with the sale, by these taxpayers, of the sweetened drinks.
Also, for the Sugar Tax a general mitigation of the administrative penalties that can be imposed in the event of missing or late payment of the tax and for formal violations has been envisaged.
Finally, the effective date should be postponed to 1 July 2021.
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