Results of the fight against fraud. Income from voluntary regularizations amounted to 1,536 million euros, 3.8% more than the previous year. In the four years of application of the Tax Fraud Prevention Plan, more than 27,000 million were collected. Investigations into the use of 500 euro banknotes have amounted to 308 million euros until 2008.

25 March 2009. The Secretary of State for Finance and Budgets, Carlos Ocaña, and the general director of the Tax Agency, Luis Pedroche, have presented the results of the application of the Tax Fraud Prevention Plan in 2008, which has allowed the collection of 8,054 million euros, a 8.3% more than the previous year. In the four years in which the plan has been applied, a total of 27,421 million euros have been collected from fraud prevention and control activities.

In 2008, direct collection from control activities, including the reduction for refunds, came to 6.518 billion euros, up 9.5% on 2007. Furthermore, collections through voluntary adjustment returns attributable to the impact of the Tax Fraud Prevention Plan increased by 3.8%, to 1.536 billion euros.

500 euro bills

Investigations on the use of large amounts of cash involving high-denomination banknotes focused on transactions in years 2003, 2004 and 2005 and have detected fraud up until 2008 of 308 million euros. Of this amount, late tax returns accounted for 223.4 million euros, debt identified for 58.7 million euros and 26.4 million euros corresponded to reported criminal offences.

Fraud control in the real estate sector

In 2008, inspections were performed on 7,747 taxpayers in this sector, 8.9% down on 2007, but, thanks to a more careful selection, the debt uncovered increased by 7.5% year on year to 1,315 million euros.

In terms of earnings from real estate, there has been a significant increase in the declaration of rental income thanks to measures including but not limited to the mandatory inclusion of the land registry reference of properties. In 2007, rental income was declared for a value of 13.8 billion euros, up by 5.2% year on year. The number of taxpayers reporting this type of income comes to 1,523,428, 10.9% up on 2006.

Guarantees for the collection of tax debt

The Tax Fraud Prevention Plan places an emphasis on improving the collection of the debt uncovered as part of actions to fight fraud. In this sense, actions to ensure the collection of debts increased by 1.2%, coming to 1,329 in 2008.

These actions are coordinated between the inspection and collection departments with a view to avoiding cases of asset relocation by fraudsters. In 2008, these actions have seen the total amount raised increase by 67.6% compared to 2007, coming to 605.7 million euros.

Taxpayer assistance

As in previous years, the Tax Agency has dedicated significant efforts to increasing taxpayer assistance as a tool of prevention.

In 2008, one out of every two tax returns (47.9%) was submitted using electronic, computer and telematic systems. As part of the 2007 Personal Income Tax campaign, the Tax Agency's website received 265 million visits.