Narvitian: the car is actually no longer in sight. Do you pay tax?

2023-08-18 10:00:50

/*! elementor – v3.6.6 – 08-06-2022 */ .elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-stacked .elementor-drop-cap{background-color:#818a91;color:#fff} .elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-framed .elementor-drop-cap{color:#818a91;border:3px solid;background-color:transparent}.elementor-widget-text-editor: not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap{margin-top:8px}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor -drop-cap-letter{width:1em;height:1em}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap{float:left;text-align:center;line-height:1;font-size: 50px}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap-letter{display:inline-block} Sergey Karpenko, head of the Narva-based company Romuexpert, advises those who do not use a car to temporarily deregister it for 2 years, and extend this period as the law permits.

The Estonian Ministry of Finance has proposed to introduce a tax on cars from July 1, 2024. As it turned out, the population does not like such planned extortions at all. And there are good reasons for that.

The state budget tax will not save

The models for calculating the future car tax proposed by state officials and many problematic points that were not taken into account at the same time caused a strong protest of the Estonian population. By the beginning of this week, the number of digital signatures on the petition against the car tax exceeded 50,000. Priit Tammeraid, Chairman of the Board of the Estonian Automobile Owners’ Association (EAOL), told Postimees that this fact indicates that there is extremely strong opposition to the introduction of a tax on cars.

Earlier, back in June of this year, EAOL announced that it does not support the intention to introduce a car tax. Estonian President Alar Karis also joined the voice of the people, who in an interview with the Maaleht newspaper noted that the authors of the tax idea themselves do not know exactly how it should be implemented and where the money will go. Karis recalled that before making public the proposal, it was necessary to conduct an analysis and get acquainted with the facts.

Vintage cars that are decades old are also proposed to be taxed.

According to Minister of Finance Mart Vyrklaev, the purpose of the new tax is to reduce the use of cars, and this is related to climate objectives. And the money, as Vyrklaev said, will go to the state budget, in which, according to the minister, there is a “hole of 1.7 billion euros.” For your information: according to the estimates of the same Ministry of Finance, in the first year after the entry into force of the car tax, it will allow collecting approximately 120 million euros.

Will this amount save the state budget? Obviously not. But the fact that the tax will hit very many Estonians hard is a fact. After all, it is planned that the new tax, which will be levied both on purchase and annually, will apply to all (except for those belonging to special services) cars, trucks, motorcycles and mopeds available in the country.

car phantoms

The authors of the auto tax project suggest that it should be levied even on vehicles that are marked in the register as unused. And there are more than 200,000 such cars in Estonia alone. To deregister a vehicle, you need to provide documents for the car and prove that you are its owner.

But it turns out that there are a lot of car enthusiasts who have not had a car recorded on them for a long time, and documents for it too. “I sold an old, rusted-through car made in 1983 back in 2000,” says Alexander from Narva. – Then I believed the buyer that he would register the car for himself. But it remained in the register as my property, although I gave all the documents during the sale. I know for sure that this car has not been on the move since 2003. It was removed from the register in the auto register this year – and only because since that time, that is, more than 20 years, insurance has not been issued for it and no technical inspection has been carried out.

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The introduction of a car tax, as it is presented today in the Ministry of Finance, will deal a serious blow to those car owners who rarely use their vehicles.

As explained to our publication in the bureau of the Estonian Department of Transport, only those cars that were destroyed or disposed of before May 1, 2004 can be removed from the register. Unfortunately, in Estonia now there is no way to write off more “younger” cars if no documents have been preserved confirming the disposal or sale of the car. The representative of the Ministry of Finance, Erle Kõomets, recently explained that it is only planned to create the possibility of deregistration of such vehicles. According to him, more details about the new system will become known next year.

Keep documents for the car

What to do in the case when you have a car that has long since passed out of your life, and the documents for it are lost? Sergey Karpenko, the head of the company Romuexpert, which has been buying faulty, unnecessary, emergency cars in Narva for more than 12 years and disposing of them, told Narva Gazeta that people now quite often turn to them for help in this particular situation. “Unfortunately, we cannot help them,” says Karpenko. – Why?

Because we can deregister a car only when it is available on our territory and with documents. When we accept a car for recycling, we also remove it from registration, so the fact of having a car is mandatory.” And in order to avoid problems, Sergey recommends not to forget that only two companies can remove cars from registration in ARK in our city. These are Romuexpert and Kuusakoski. Therefore, all actions with your car must be strictly documented.

As for the proposal to tax cars that have not passed technical inspection and insurance, Sergey does not see any logic in this. “I don’t know how the car tax will work in reality, but my opinion is that if the car is deregistered at least temporarily, the tax should not be levied on it,” he is sure. – Why? Yes, because, according to common sense, car tax is levied on a car that moves on the roads of Estonia. And if he is deregistered, then he cannot legally move at all.” Indeed, in this case, the car does not pollute the environment with exhaust emissions, does not wear out the road surface, and does not spend resources on repairs and maintenance.

In Narva, hundreds of cars are decommissioned every year, the owners of which rent them for spare parts and scrap metal to companies specializing in this. According to Karpenko, only Romuexpert accepts about 300 such vehicles for recycling per year.

Tax must be fair

The introduction of a car tax, as it is presented today in the Ministry of Finance, will deal a serious blow to those car owners who rarely use their vehicles. People who drive cars or motorcycles only in the warm season, heirs who have received a car, but do not yet have rights – but you never know what reasons car owners may have. And tax regulations should take this into account.

Another category of victims of an unfair tax includes fans of retro cars, lovers of old technology, who do a great and useful job, restoring and preserving rarities. On August 2, a meeting of representatives of 12 organizations belonging to the Union of Estonian Antique Technology Clubs was held in Vyhma. The president of the Classic Riders club in Narva, Pavel Petrash, told NG that the collection was mainly about the planned car tax.

“We consider it wrong to impose a tax on this type of transport,” he said. – Only in our club there are 8 units of very old equipment. In other clubs there are 20-30. They are all at the registration, but we practically don’t go to them, only a few times a year for events. And the payment of tax on such a “transport” does not suit any of the owners of retro equipment at all.

According to Petrash, at the meeting it was decided to prepare, with the help of lawyers, an appeal to the government with a proposal not to impose auto tax on vintage collectible equipment. “It’s like taking a tax on museum exhibits,” says the president of the Classic Riders club.

The collection of signatures against the autotax ends at midnight on August 31st.

The signatures are then submitted to the Riigikogu.

The petition can be found here:

Material and photo: Alexander Myasoedov

The post Narvityanin: the car is actually no longer in sight. Do you pay tax? first appeared on gazeta.ee.