Iranian doctors protest against the installation of card readers in the fight against tax evasion
Experts from various fields in the medical community strongly protested the Tax Affairs Organization's move to require them to use a bank card reader, calling the move "illegal" and "discriminatory."
The medical community and related disciplines have strongly reacted to the requirement to use bank card readers issued by the Tax Affairs Organization in the fight against tax evasion.
According to Fars News Agency, the heads of the Medical System Organization of Bushehr and Zahedan, the Iranian Radiology Scientific Association, the Iranian General Dentists Association, and the Gilan Province Dentists Employers' Association, in a letter to Dr. Mohammad Reza Zafarghandi, the head of the Medical System Organization, and Eshaq Jahangiri, First Vice President, considered the experts of this profession "among the most reputable" people in society and called for "removing trade discrimination" and removing this requirement.
In order to combat tax evasion, and as an additional clause to Note 6 of the 2019 Budget Law, the Islamic Consultative Assembly has required doctors to use a store terminal (bank card reader).
Ali Rostampour, Director General of the Tax Affairs Organization's Regulatory and Outsourcing Office, referred to this note on August 23, giving medical, paramedical, pharmaceutical, and veterinary business owners until August 13 to register to use the store terminal.
A few hours after the news was published, Rostampour announced in an interview with the Iranian Broadcasting Corporation that those who do not use this card reader in medical professions will be subject to fines.
He said: "Doctors who are equipped with this system will have 10 percent of their declared taxes forgiven for two years. On the other hand, those who do not use these devices will be subject to a fine of two percent of the income from the sale of their services."
Hadi Khani, Director General of Inspection and Combating Tax Evasion at the Tax Affairs Organization, also called on people on Sima Channel 2 to report the matter to the Tax Affairs Organization's news headquarters if they notice the absence of a card reader when visiting medical centers.
In their protest letters, some of which were published by Fars News Agency, doctors and various medical community organizations have pointed out the distinction between medical and commercial centers and emphasized that if this measure were applied solely to the owners of this profession, it would be "discriminatory" and would imply that tax evasion among doctors is "pervasive."
Fars writes that, according to statistics from the Tax Affairs Organization, doctors pay only 150 billion tomans in taxes. However, the Majlis Research Center, in a report published in January last year, estimated their actual tax amount to be at least 6,700 billion tomans.
Source: DW
