VAT numbers, tax extension to 20 July. Then you pay 0.8% more

Postponement from 30 June to 20 July for VAT payments for VAT payers who are obliged to pay tax and those who are in some way connected, such as flat-rate tax payers. But the real difference from previous editions lies in the 'second half' of the postponement: from 21 July to 20 August, the surcharge for this year will not be 0.4 per cent but exactly double that, i.e. 0.8 per cent.

The solution devised for the excise quater decree dismissed by the Council of Ministers and expected to be published in the Official Gazette on 22 May therefore envisages a postponement of the deadline for the payment of taxes deriving from the 2026 tax returns (tax year 2025) from 30 June to 20 July. However, it is the following month that is new compared to the past. From 21 July to 20 August, in fact, a surcharge of 0.8 per cent will have to be added to the amount due.

This should also serve as a kind of deterrent not to take payments beyond 20 July, because there is essentially a cash flow issue to be preserved. Shifting the horizon even further would mean delaying a flow that never before has to take into account other challenges as in this particularly critical phase for the economy, first and foremost the buffer measures against high fuel prices.

In any case, the solution is a response to the requests received from the production categories and especially from representatives of VAT holders and professionals. In a letter addressed last week to both Minister of the Economy Giancarlo Giorgetti and Deputy Minister Maurizio Leo, five trade associations (Confartigianato, Cna, Casartigiani, Confcommercio and Confesercenti) asked for a postponement of the payments, justifying their request for the postponement of the deadline in the publication by the financial administration of the 'Your Isa 2026 Cpb' software, which was only released on Wednesday 13 May.

A timing also dictated by the wait for the changes to be made to the arrangement with tax authorities in the tax decree. The conversion of the measure moved to 15 May (as opposed to the original date of 15 April) the deadline for publishing the software and to 31 October (as opposed to 30 September) the deadline for opting for the pact with the tax authorities in the two-year period 2026-2028. And now taxpayers and the professionals who assist them are called upon to familiarise themselves with the additional changes to the software released on 20 May to also take into account the two additional thresholds of 35% and 30% to income increases in the proposal for the two-year agreement aimed at the most unreliable VAT parcels because they are considered to be at greater risk of evasion.