Venezuela will charge oil firms four years of back taxes on some operations as the government clamps down on the oil industry, a tax official said Tuesday.
Venezuela has been investigating 32 operating agreements with private oil firms for months, claiming they have not been paying enough taxes. Last month, the Seniat tax office raised the income tax rate on the projects to 50 percent from 34 percent, saying the oil firms were paying a cheap industrial rate under dodgy contracts signed in the 1990s.
Jose Zedillo, a top official at the Seniat handling the investigation, said the office will back charge the 50 percent rate as of 2001, even though operations started in the 1990s.
"It will be limited to the last four years," said Zedillo, explaining that tax regulations do not allow the office to recover unpaid taxes from over four years ago.
The Seniat is also investigating oil firms for inflating costs involved with operating agreements to reduce the tax load. He said only a few of the firms operating the oil fields pay taxes at all, as tax filings include unjustifiable costs such as training programs and foreign currency losses.
