The IRIS interconnection obligation does not apply to B2B transactions and blockchain employees

As the deadline of 2 September 2024 for the interconnection of Greek professionals and traders with direct payment services (IRIS) is approaching (for legal persons and legal entities, the Ministry of Finance has announced the obligation to interconnect with IRIS by March 2025) to remove any doubts in the field, but also to avoid unnecessary inconvenience for a large group of taxpayers, we have to point out the following:

✔ Pursuant to paragraph 4 of Article 65 of Law No. 4446/2016, as added by Article 46 of Law No. 5072/2023:
“Freelancers and traders who keep a professional account, in accordance with the joint decision issued on the basis of the authorization of paragraph c) of par. 3*, shall be obliged to accept payments by means of direct payment services.”

* Case c’ of the paragraph states that by decision of the Ministries of Economy and Finance and Development the procedures for the declaration and modification of the Professional Accounts held with Payment Service Providers are defined.

For the maintenance of Business Accounts as well as for the obligation of interconnection and acceptance of card payments (POS), the decision 119899/13-12-2023 “Arrangements for the acceptance of card and other means of payment – Replacement of the joint decision of the Ministers of Economy and Development and Finance No. 45231/20-04-2017 “Arrangement of the obligation to accept card payments, according to article 65 of Law No. 4446/2016, (A’ 240)” (B’ 1445)” where in article 1 of this article the payment beneficiaries who accept payment instruments with payment card and payment instruments with direct payment services from account to account, such as the I.R.I.S. online payments service, are defined, and which are those who provide services to consumers or operate with CPAs included in the table of the decision, and in article 4 the procedures for the declaration and modification of business accounts held with the payment service providers of the payment beneficiaries of article 1.

✔ In case a’ of paragraph 5 of paragraph 5 of the circular 2037/2019 of the Hellenic Revenue Agency “Clarifications on the obligation to declare a Business Account to the Independent Public Revenue Authority” which is in force, the following are mentioned:

“Payees (natural persons, legal persons and legal entities) with an Activity Code Number, either primary or secondary, included in the list of the CMA No. 45231/20-04-2017, and who accept transactions from payers who act for reasons that do not fall within their commercial, business or professional activity (B2C transactions), are obliged to declare a business account. Payment recipients who deal with payers who act within the scope of their commercial, business or professional activity (B2B transactions) are not required to declare a business account, even if they have an ID included in the list of the CUA No. 45231/2017. It should be noted that the obligation to declare a Business Account exists also in case B2B transactions are carried out in parallel with B2C transactions.
Payees are required to declare all their business accounts if transactions carried out by electronic means of payment are carried out in more than one business account.
The above applies respectively to taxpayers who earn income from wages and pensions under paragraph f’ of par. 2 of Article 12 of Law No. 4172/2013.”

✔ In conclusion, the provision on the acceptance of payments by direct account-to-account payment services, such as the IRIS online payments service, does not apply to payment recipients with B2B transactions, including taxpayers in case f’ of paragraph 2 of Article 12(2) of the Tax Code (salaried employees with a “blockchain”).

Therefore, for the above taxpayers the relevant obligation does not exist, so there is no question of imposing penalties if they do not proceed with the relevant interface with IRIS by September 2nd (i.e. they should ignore the emails sent by the A.A.D.E.).

However, if B2C transactions are carried out in parallel, there is an obligation to declare a business account and thus an obligation to make payments via IRIS.