Beware!: Unpaid invoices must be declared until they are settled
Invoices not paid on time or paid late will have to be declared online every quarter until they are cleared, warns Mohamed Lahyani, President of the Tax Commission of Chartered Accountants for the North of Morocco. The first deadline was set for Tuesday October 31, that was the last deadline for filings for Q3 2023.
It is worth remembering that, as is the case with the car tax sticker and other electricity or telephone bills, many taxpayers will have to file their returns at the last minute. This declaration obviously concerns invoices of 10,000 Dirhams incl. tax (USD 1,000 incl. tax), issued between July 1, the date of entry into force of Law no. 69-19, and Sept. 30, 2023. One of the points that continues to be the focus of debate concerns proof of payment. Clearly, the presentation of a cheque does not constitute proof of payment for everyone. For the tax authorities, it is the actual collection date shown on the bank statement that confirms actual payment of an invoice.
“I advise customers to give their suppliers a cheque and have them sign a dated copy, which serves as an acknowledgement of receipt and therefore proof of payment to the tax authorities”, explained Brahim Bahmad, a chartered accountant and partner in the firm of the same name. In practice, however, a supplier may not pay the cheque immediately, and may keep it for several days before cashing it.
The tax authorities’ apprehension of the question of actual payment is not unlike the treatment of VAT, where the operating event remains the collection. As a result, tax authorities need to be able to cross-reference VAT files. But among professionals, discussions are lively.
Some are not hesitating to invoke the provisions of article 7 of decree no. 617-04 on default interest on public contracts. This stipulates that “for the purpose of calculating the amount of interest on arrears, the date of actual payment is understood to be the date on which the assigned accountant executes the transfer to the beneficiary, remits the cheque to the beneficiary or his bank, presents any other means of payment to the clearing house, or executes a stop payment or any other duly notified impediment”. This implies recognition of the delivery of the cheque as proof of payment. Other practitioners rely on the provisions of the French Commercial Code relating to cheques, which are a means of sight payment.
It is also likely that, once the law has been implemented for the first time, certain imperfections will become apparent, as well as mistakes made by some taxpayers… There is therefore room for improvement in a law that is still in its infancy.
Hassan EL ARIF
