Mr.Rizwan
Sajan- Chairman and Founder Danube Group said: “The UAE is moving gradually
from a non-tax environment to a tax environment - that will give the UAE
Government additional income to fund the country’s development activities. This
comes about four years after the introduction of VAT, in January 2018. This
might put the businesses into a difficult situation initially. This could have
been introduced a few years later, as most small and medium enterprises are
still struggling to survive. However, businesses will adjust to this eventually
like the rest of the developed world.”
“The
good thing is that the tax will be introduced on June 1, 2023 - that gives the
businesses some time to prepare for this. Most SMEs in the UAE do not have the
system to post audited financial results. So, they have to catch up a bit. The
auditing firms will become busy suddenly. The government could put the tax
ceiling at a much higher level, say Dh10 million upwards - to start with and
then gradually increase the tax base. That would give the SMEs more time to
recover and prepare for getting into the tax environment.”