720,000 people must submit declarations: what steps to take – Hrayr Kamendatyan

720,000 people must submit declarations. I will try to present as accessibly as possible what steps an ordinary citizen should take and of course, what issues exist. This was stated by economist Hrayr Kamendatyan on his Facebook page.

“Digital slavery! 720,000 people must submit declarations. I will try to present as accessibly as possible what steps an ordinary citizen should take and of course, what issues exist. So, if you do not have an ID card, hurry to register at passport offices, and after receiving it, approach your mobile operator’s office (Viva, Ucom, Team...) and with their assistance obtain an electronic signature (mID).

Then, you need to go to the bank or banks where you receive your salary or other transfers (in short, however many banks and accounts you have) and get the statements that show the transactions from January 1, 2024, to December 31, 2024. If you have online banking, then you can skip getting a statement and obtain the data through that tool.

Next, through the Tax Committee’s website or by downloading the mobile application, you start filling it out. There are two types of fields available: 1- Taxable income and 2- Non-taxable income. For the first, in the Taxable income windows, the data will be automatically filled if you have been registered and worked, and the accountant of that institution has paid your taxes, or if you work under a civil contract, again, the accountant of the other party has passed your taxes.

For the second section - Non-taxable income, you will need to fill it out yourself. Here, you write down all the positive entries visible from the bank statement, simply put, how much money has been transferred to your card or account… (Here is where it is appropriate to be frustrated, but continue reading). Whatever you write in this field, the Tax Committee will not demand taxes for it, but if suspiciously large and recurrent amounts are received, rest assured they will remember you.

ISSUES ———————————— If, for example, you decide to transfer money for someone’s medical treatment, remember that you must declare it, or if you buy coffee with friends and transfer money for the bill to another friend, he must declare that as well. If you lend someone money, say 50,000 AMD and he returns the same amount, you declare it but do not pay tax on it, but if he returns it with interest, then you will have to pay tax.

Moreover, a more typical Armenian issue is that the majority of the population has relatives abroad, or even family members who frequently or infrequently send money to relatives and families living in Armenia. Therefore, in 2026, when you submit the declaration for the year 2025, you will begin to pay taxes to the state on the money sent by your family members living abroad. ATTENTION, starting from January 1, 2025, it will affect you.

So here, in 2024, for what you receive, the Tax Committee is kind enough to only require you to declare, but they will not collect taxes. First, the relative living abroad works and pays taxes to that country, and sends money from his savings to a relative living in Armenia, so why should that money be taxed again here? Later, the Tax Committee justifies that the goal is not to collect more taxes, but to obtain financial information from citizens. But then why have they legally amended the law and granted all banks access to confidential data? It can be seen for what reason this is all being done.

By the way, last year the process completely collapsed; about half of the 120,000 people who had the obligation to submit declarations did not submit them. And the author and executor of all this is an absolutely ignorant financial person, literally an absolute ignoramus. Just a couple of days ago, this knowledge-deficient individual announced that the economy is economic behavior ))))))))) ”, he wrote.