Galery

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An isolated incident or the tip of the iceberg? Either way, the genuine tax dodging orgy, which took place at the ticket desk of the Knossos archaeological monument in Crete, went beyond even the wildest imagination. We point out that the archaeological site belongs to the Archaeological Receipts Fund under the Ministry of Culture.

An inspection of the Special Control Office found that not a single receipt was issued during a whole business day; it was subsequently found that the cash register was not even registered at the local tax office.

According to a report of tvxs.gr, the checks were triggered by tourist whistleblowers who complained that when buying souvenirs from the Knossos Museum's shop they weren't given any receipts.

So the inspectors cast themselves as tourists buying also tickets for the archaeological site, and then sat around watching how the 8 ticket sellers were doing business. Every time they collected the cash for a ticket, they simply jotted down the amount in an ordinary notebook. When the inspectors revealed their identity, the ticket sellers said they skipped receipt issuance as they were  ... too busy and and couldn't cope.

When asked to pop-up a receipt from the cash register, they initially said the unit was out of order. But the inspectors found the register was all right. Nonetheless, when they tried to verify the data on the receipt through the state tax online system, TAXIS, they found that the cash register had never been registered with the tax office, and was therefore illegal.

Asked by the inspectors why they worked the way they did, ticket sellers and shopkeepers repeated over and over again they were 'ordered from above' to skip the receipts, without providing any explanation what the order exactly said, and who was sitting 'above'.

All in all, the inspectors found a total of 534 infringements (non-issuance of receipts) in just one day; they are going to give the place some further scrutiny to figure out out whether or not some other tax violations were committed there.

Zero Tolerance

Deputy Culture Minister Nikos Xydakis promised zero tolerance: "We expect the formal report of the tax authorities to proceed with our disciplinary process ASAP. There will be zero tolerance for civil servants who failed to protect the public interest."

Aspasia Louvi-Kizi, president of the Archaeological Receipts Fund, also made a statement (before tvxs.gr) explaining that the Fund is a legal entity of public law, and in practice it is the cultural ministry's revenue collection mechanism. "I believe that with this investigation the Office for Combating Economic Crimes helps us in our effort to put our house in order. Indeed, this case will go to the justice system, but we, in our capacity as the Archaeological Receipts Fund and the Ministry of culture, will do what we have to in terms of the responsibility of those involved."