Despite disruptions in controls due to the health crisis, the fight against tax fraud brought in nearly 7.8 billion euros to public finances in France in 2020, announced the French Ministry of the Economy and Finance , this Tuesday.

"Over the whole of 2020, collections following tax audits reached 7.79 billion euros, a level close to those of the year 2018 (7.73 billion euros)", indicates a Bercy press release.

An “exceptional” year 2019

He specifies that the gross rate of recovery of sums due after control has improved, from 51% to 59%. “After an exceptional year 2019 (when the tax authorities had recovered 9 billion euros), the results of the tax audit in 2020 reflect, despite the economic and health crisis, the continuation of efforts to fight against tax fraud within the framework of the new relationship of trust ”, underlines the document.

A law of August 2018 notably established a "right to make mistakes" for individuals and companies, who benefit from a priori good faith in the event of error during administrative procedures such as tax declarations.

They can thus rectify them, spontaneously or at the request of the administration, and avoid penalties for the first failure.

Tax audit operations and appeal procedures were disrupted by the health crisis.

In particular, they were suspended between March and the end of June, before a gradual resumption from July.

In addition, agents who usually deal with tax audits “have been mobilized to support measures to support the economy”.

The “emergency arrangements” of the crisis checked

A total of 365,200 checks were carried out in 2020, a figure down 17% compared to the previous year. "Despite the suspension of controls for a large part of the year, 2020 was not a black year for the tax audit: on the contrary, the new requirements of support for companies have accelerated its transformation", commented the French Minister of Public Accounts, Olivier Dussopt, quoted in the press release. "The means deployed to fight against fraud, in particular by the processing of bulk data, have made it possible to target controls more closely," he added.

In the context of the health crisis and the deployment of support systems for companies and employees, Bercy has favored the control of “natural persons not affected by the crisis”, for example in the context of successions and that of “emergency systems. ".

In detail, with regard to the solidarity fund, 43,500 controls revealed 64 million euros of undue payments in April 2020 and April 2021. Controls before the payment of aid also made it possible to avoid "immediate payments for nearly 1.8 million requests ”.

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  • Tax fraud

  • Control

  • Economy

  • Taxes

  • Economy Minister