Article
Russian government legitimated the disposal fee, but reduced the waste tax

Amendments to the federal law “On Production and Consumption Waste” will come into force from 1 January, 2014. According to this law, domestic manufacturers together with outside will have to pay the disposal fee.

New amendments are to settle claims of the European Union and other countries importing vehicles of violating by the Russian Federation of the World Trade Organization rules. Besides, they are to become the legal basis for fulfillment by the RF of its obligations as a member of the WTO for creation of equal competitive terms for domestic and outside vehicle manufacturers.

As a reminder, initially disposal fee was introduced in 2012 and worked only for foreign vehicles. At that moment authorities promised to spend assets arrived to the budget from car manufacturers on creation of environmentally-friendly technologies for vehicles recycling.

Introduction of the disposal fee a year ago didn’t result in substantial increase of prices, due to severe rivalry on the market and descending demand for products. The strongest was the reaction of the truck market that time. According to experts, after introduction of the equalizing amendments, when both importers and manufacturers have to pay, gradual increase of prices is expected.

As a matter of fact, the disposal fee is a payment for disposal of the goods. Basic rate of the fee for cars accounts for 20 thousand rubles, for commercial, dual-purpose and truck vehicles – 150 thousand rubles. Further on the basic rate multiplies by the special ratio that considers the year of vehicle’s manufacture, its mass and other functional characteristics, that influence on expenditures on disposal of this vehicle.

At the same time the disposal fee won’t cover vintage cars, equipment imported by the members of the state programs for rendering help to compatriots, living abroad, vehicles of refugees, representatives of international organizations and diplomatic consular institutions.

Meanwhile, in a panel session of Foreign Investment Advisory Council the vice Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich stated that domestic companies that will have to pay the disposal fee would get a kind of tax deduction. It is expected to fix deduction from tax basis when calculating income tax. Also the vice Prime Minister brought into focus the fact that requirements to some manufacturers or other will be introduced gradually. Considering readiness of economy sectors, the government will have to define for what kind of goods the obligations will come into effect in 2015, and for what kind later.

Representatives of entrepreneurial community are concerned about their disposal contributions. Thus, according to the Treasury for budget implementation, for 2012 budget replenishment owing to the disposal fee accounts for 51, 6 billion of rubles. Now discussions about the status of the contribution fund are in progress (will it be budgetary or off-budgetary) and how it will be managed in order to provide purposive character of payments.

Article
Sole proprietors’ accounts will be insured

As is known, small and medium business forms the lion share of the GDP in developed economy. Our country is eager to follow the same way that is why from time to time we can hear officials speaking of the small business support, creation of the open business landscape, improvement of legal system in this field, necessity of administrative restrictions liberalization and so on. At the same time, according to Federal Tax Service for January-September of 2013 more than 759 thousands sole proprietors have gone out of business, including due to decision on termination of activity – 745,8 thousands; due to court decision on declaration of sole proprietor bankruptcy – 1,1 thousand.

These figures are eloquent of the fact that everything goes not so well in this field now. Frequently, bankruptcy of the credit organization, where the sole proprietor has accounts, is the reason for the business termination. In opposition to household deposits, accounts of sole proprietors are not insured in the Deposit insurance system (DIS). Not every sole proprietor, as well as any other average citizen, could estimate reliability and risk of the bank.

Therefore, ombudsman for protection of entrepreneur rights Boris Titov and ombudsman for protection of entrepreneur rights in the banking sector Mikhail Mamuta commenced amendment of the law «On insuring of natural persons’ deposits with the banks of the Russian Federation». It is expected that accounts of sole proprietors will be insured. Thus, according to this initiative, the insurance similar to household deposits insurance would cover sole proprietors’ accounts, opened in the banks – members of Deposit insurance system.

Such amendments seem to be quite reasonable and logical. Under the conditions of country’s stagnation and uncertainty in future, they are to give positive signal to the business landscape. Moreover, according to estimates of the Ministry of Economic Development, total sum of sole proprietors’ assets on accounts in the banks numbers is just 1,2% of household deposits volume. It will actually make no impact on DIS.

Information agency Credinform is preparing to issue an independent methodology for identification of the bank financial condition that will help entrepreneurs to estimate the degree of reliability of bank and extent of cooperation with credit organizations.