The main changes introduced by the Finance Act for 2020, provided for by Act No. 78/2019 of 23 December 2019, mainly concern:
Corporate tax and personal income tax (IRPP)
- Setting the tax regime for Takaful insurance (Art. 11 to 22)
- Easing the conditions for granting the flat-rate regime to individuals established outside municipal areas (Art. 42)
- Clarifying the hydrocarbon-sector services subject to the 35% corporate tax rate (Art. 25)
- Raising the deduction threshold for dependent parents (Art. 41)
- Revision of the temporary social contribution (Art. 39)
- Including high value-added services among the activities subject to the 13.5% corporate tax rate (Art. 26)
- Generalising the reduction of the withholding-tax rate from 15% to 5% for film activities and copyright (Art. 46)
VAT, customs duties and local tax (TCL)
- Linking the granting of tax benefits and suspensive regimes to the settlement of customs debts (Art. 35)
- Clarifying the rules for applying donations to VAT and other taxes and harmonising them with international conventions (Art. 28)
- Postponing the 19% VAT rate on residential real estate (Art. 31)
- Setting the date for subjecting medicines to VAT (Art. 30)
- Extending the customs-duty surcharge on imports of Turkish products for a further 2 years (Art. 52)
- Introducing a levy on online sales in Tunisia by non-resident companies (Art. 27)
- Aligning customs late-payment interest with the rates applied by the public accounting code (Art. 51)
Registration and stamp duty
- Reducing the registration-duty burden on acquisitions by public-servant housing offices (Art. 45)
- Adopting electronic means for the registration of documents and contracts and payable stamp duties (Art. 23)
Investment incentives
- Suspension of VAT on equipment for the agricultural sector (Art. 36)
- Extending the incentive for companies to list their shares on the stock exchange (Art. 37 and 38)
- Clarifying the scope of Article 15 of Act 2019-47 of 29 May 2019 on improving the investment climate (Art. 29)
Other provisions
- Revision of the amount payable to suspend automatic tax-assessment decisions (Art. 32)
- Empowering tax services to adopt the results of on-site inspection visits during preliminary audits (Art. 33)
- Extending the tax limitation period for minimum declarations (Art. 34)
- Adopting a legal framework for exchanging information and correspondence between tax services and taxpayers by electronic means (Art. 24)
- Measures in favour of associations for people with disabilities and people without family support (Art. 43)
- Measures in favour of the olive-oil sector (Art. 55 and 56)
