Taxi drivers accuse Uber and Bolt of tax evasion and illegal operation

The notices that the ADR issued for Uber and Bolt are actually given for companies from Estonia and the Netherlands, although the law provides for their issuance for companies registered at the Trade Registry in Romania. Based on this trick, the Romanian state cannot even collect VAT from Uber and Bolt, although the two companies collect it.

The Info Taxi Association sent an address to ADR on June 29, 2023, reporting these irregularities and asking for clarifications, but neither ADR nor the Ministry of Digitalization reacted, leaving Uber and Bolt companies to continue operating with the same notices issued for Estonian companies , respectively the Netherlands.

Art. 6 of GEO no. 49/2019 on alternative transport says very clearly that the notices issued by ADR should have been for Romanian branches of companies, not for commercial companies from other states, as issued by ADR. The taxi drivers show that the violation of the legal provisions should lead to the withdrawal of these notices, but no one takes into account the legislation in force, at the government level.

Why is VAT not collected?

ANAF, which should check whether these platforms have paid VAT in Romania, did not do any control in this regard, although the taxi drivers have evidence – several contracts and invoices – that show that the law was also violated from a fiscal point of view.

The Confederation of Authorized Operators and Transporters from Romania (COTAR) sent a press release, attaching proof of invoices and contracts, asking for explanations from the Romanian Government regarding the operation of companies that mediate alternative transport (digital platforms).

The most serious violation of the law is non-payment of VAT, for which Art. 21 of the Alternative Transport Law specifies: “(1) All incomes obtained from performing alternative transport are taxed in accordance with the tax legislation in force in Romania”. “In violation of the law, platforms for alternative transport have, until now, operated on the basis of documents issued for companies from other states and without payment of VAT,” says COTAR.

The authority says it is trying to harmonize the legislation

In reply, the representative of the Coalition for the Digitization of Romania, Cătălin Codreanu, did not want to comment more than that: “The taxi industry is looking by any means to find the blame for its own failure elsewhere. According to the industry, others are to blame for the quality of taxi services, not taximetry. Alternative transport platforms are approved and operate according to national and community legislation”. Although we pressed for clarification from a legal point of view, the representative of the Uber-Bolt Coalition declined to make any further comment.

Instead, the Authority says that from their point of view, the authorizations were given according to the law. “The Authority for the Digitization of Romania approves the alternative transport digital platforms through which the alternative transport activity is intermediated, strictly from a technical point of view, in accordance with the provisions of GEO 49/2019 regarding alternative transport activities with passenger car and driver approved by Law 204 /2019. In this sense, we emphasize the fact that both at the time of approval and now, the operators of the platforms mentioned by you proved the existence of the subsidiaries required by the provisions of the previously mentioned normative acts. However, in the light of recent controversies, ADR considers harmonizing the legislation with the requests of all the factors involved, as long as they do not contradict other normative acts in force. As for the aspects related to taxation, they do not fall under the authority of the Authority for the Digitization of Romania”, answered ADR, for Jurnalul.

The problem that remains unsolved is the approval of companies from other countries, not the branches in Romania, so that the documents and, implicitly, the payments are made directly to companies from Estonia, respectively from the Netherlands, as shown by the documents that came into the possession of the taxi drivers.

Error in favor of foreign companies

The transporters show how many articles of GEO 49//2019 were violated by ADR, for the benefit of the companies Uber and Bolt: Art. 2, letter j): “operator of the digital platform is the legal entity in whose name the technical opinion for the digital platform is issued through which alternative transport is intermediated”, and letter – b) “technical approval means a document issued by the Ministry of Communications and Information Society for the digital platforms made available by their operators, which ensures the intermediation of alternative transport”.

Also, Art. 6 specifies: “In the situation where the operator of the digital platform is a non-resident legal person, he is obliged to have, during the entire period in which he carries out his activity of intermediation of alternative transport on the territory of Romania, a subsidiary registered with the Office National Trade Register, through which commercial activities are carried out in Romania”.

“Checking the list of digital platforms technically approved by your institution, we notice that there are two approvals (Uber BV legally represented by UBER BV – Filiala București SRL and Bolt Operation OU, legally represented by Bolt Services Ro SRL) issued to the parent entities in the Netherlands and , respectively, Estonia, not to their branches in Romania”, the Association signaled to ADR and the Ministry of Digitalization, but no one has given them an answer, since June 2023 until now.

By not publishing the notice on the website, Uber also violated Art 25 letter n) of GEO 49, which stipulates that the company is obliged “to publish on the digital platform the technical notice issued by the Ministry of Communications and Information Society”.

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