Bulgaria's tax agency has checked more than 270 shipments of cargo from outside the EU since the start of September. Lora Georgieva, chief expert in the National Revenue Agency's (NRA) press office, gave the figures at a briefing on Wednesday at the port of Varna West.
The checks target goods from Turkey, China and other non-EU countries, mostly clothes, shoes and household items.
More than 180 of the checks involved goods that had cleared customs in Bulgaria. Over 20 involved goods that had cleared customs in another EU country before entering Bulgaria. More than 80 others were carried out as goods under watch left warehouses and other sites the agency monitors.
Officials track the goods from the moment they arrive and get unloaded, through their movement afterwards, to their final sale. They check which vehicles carry the goods and where they get unloaded, how much stock traders keep in their warehouses, and how the goods move down the chain to the end customer. During on-site checks, officials compare transport, customs and accounting paperwork with the stock they actually find.
"We follow the whole chain, from the import of these goods from a non-EU country right through to the sale to the end customer," Georgieva said.
The findings so far show a big gap between the value declared at import and the price the goods sell for, she said. The goods come in at low declared values, and by the time they reach the end customer, the price has shot up several times over.
This will let the agency pick out risky goods and groups of goods, sort them, and propose adding them to the list of goods it treats as high tax risk, Georgieva said. The results will go into final reports the NRA will use to decide where to focus its work, add to the list, plan its budget, and check whether the taxes traders declare match what they actually earn.
The NRA has already been watching how such goods move, but the new analysis will show whether they should now count as high tax risk, she added.