Filenews 14 January 2025 - by Eleftheria Paizanou
Some football companies are making efforts to raise money and pay off some of their debts to the Tax Department, as well as their debts to the Social Insurance Department.
The hourglass of time is empty for the clubs, which will initially have to pay tax debts of €4.1 million, which they created after the implementation of the new debt repayment plan in May 2023, as well as debts to Social Insurance beyond €9.5 million, in order to avoid adventures with Justice.
It should be noted that, in the case of social security debts, some of the clubs had cut contributions from the salaries of footballers and other workers, without however paying them to the state. After the ultimatum given by the Government that it will not proceed with a revision (new relaxation) of the debt repayment plan and after the decision of the Tax Department to prepare indictments against four clubs that owe the largest amount, some clubs are informed that they are collecting money to pay off some of their obligations to the state, in order to avoid criminal prosecution and comply with its criteria UEFA.
The Tax Department remains immovable in its position for the implementation of tax legislation and will not consent to any new settlement if the unions do not pay some of their debts quickly. In case clubs pay a large part of the additional debts they created in violation of the repayment plan, it is not excluded that the payment of the remaining debts with another 2-3 instalments will be accepted.
Headache the big 4
The effort of the technocrats of the Ministries of Finance and Labor focuses on the four major unions (APOEL, Apollon, AEL and Anorthosis), which have the largest part of the total debts of the unions. They are required to pay promptly to the Tax Department an amount of €2.53 million, against their total debts, which amount to €25.6 million. They also have debts of €9.5 million for late contributions to Social Insurance.
The biggest problem seems to be faced by APOEL, which, in addition to the indictments that tax officials are preparing for him, will have to be represented tomorrow Wednesday in court, for debts to the Social Insurance Department, amounting to €2.3 million, relating to five criminal cases for the period 2020-2022, for non-payment of contributions to the Social Insurance Fund, the Leave Fund, the Redundancy Fund, the Human Resources Development and Social Cohesion Fund and the GHS. The total debt of this association for late contributions to social insurance is estimated at €4.3 million.
How much do they have to pay?
In detail, the four groups will have to pay directly to the state the following amounts:
- APOEL will have to pay debts of €667,000 to the Tax Department as soon as possible, while its longitudinal debts are €11.6 million. Also, in Social Insurance it has total debts of €4.3 million, for which it is being brought to justice for €2.3 million. In order to avoid the case being heard in court now, APOEL will have to pay the current debts to Social Insurance, around €600,000. That is, APOEL will have to pay taxes and social insurance in excess of €1.3 million. Sources from the Nicosia team told "F" that APOEL contacted the competent bodies and had meetings to settle the debts. In fact, it was reported that APOEL paid some amounts to the state, which is not confirmed by the competent authorities.
- Apollo will now have to pay tax debts of €1 million out of a total of €4.8 million that it owes. It also has arrears in social insurance of €2.5 million.
- AEL created new tax debts amounting to €683,200. The total of its debts to the Tax Department is €5 million. It also owes €1.7 million. towards social security.
- Anorthosis will now have to pay taxes of €188,100, while its total tax debts are €4.2 million. Added to this are arrears to social insurance, amounting to €1 million.
As we have been duly advised, in addition to APOEL, football clubs have to settle their debts to the Social Insurance Department. That is, they pay their debts by instalments. In addition to the four unions, other groups also have debts to social security, but for much smaller amounts.
