Small business: smart cash registers could lead to the closure of around 12,000 traders

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BNS 2025-11-10 10:44:39 Comments: 0

With the State Tax Inspectorate (STI) starting to penalise small entrepreneurs who do not yet have smart cash registers from the beginning of next year, business representatives claim that the excessive requirements could lead to the closure of their business activities or to about 12,000 traders going into the shadows.

When the requirement for small businesses to have smart cash registers came into force in May this year, the Inland Revenue promised not to penalise entrepreneurs until the end of the year if they make the effort to equip themselves with them.

In the meantime, from the beginning of next year, the inspectorate will start imposing liability on traders who fail to equip themselves with such cash registers: the first fine will be EUR 200-390, the second EUR 390-780, and the total amount of the fine for failing to provide data to the i.EKA subsystem of smart electronic cash registers could exceed EUR 1,000, the VMI told BNS.

According to Laurynas Grunulaitė, a representative of VMI's Operative Control Department, about 13,000 small entrepreneurs are still using old cash registers.

However, their number is decreasing – currently, about 400 new cash registers start submitting data to i.EKA every week, and out of almost 19,000 cash registers, almost 15,000 taxpayers are already submitting data. In September, the figures were 17,000 and 13,000 respectively.

According to Vytenis Butkevičius, head of the association „Lietuvos prekyvietės ir turgavietės“, small entrepreneurs for whom it is too expensive to buy a smart cash register will close down their business or go into the shadows.

„People who are unable to afford cash registers (...) will simply be forced to go into the shadows or close down. And if they do, we will all suffer," Butkevičius told BNS.

„1 thousand euros (the cost of a smart cash register – BNS). If you don't have internet, there are additional charges. For some people, it costs up to €1,500. (...) If a person earns 45,000 euros a year, divide (that figure – BNS) by at least 20-30% – that is the profit. Then look at the amount (of profit – BNS) that these costs represent. A huge amount“, – BNS explained D. Matukienė.

V. Butkevičius stressed that most of the markets are located in the provinces, where trading takes place three or four days a month, so the purchase of smart cash registers puts a big financial burden on such traders.

The representative of the Tax Inspectorate emphasises that exceptions apply in such cases.

„The use of a cash register is not required for residents who operate with a trade business licence if the business is intended to trade only one or two days a week. In this case, if the person so requests, a receipt or other accounting document must be issued to the buyer," L. Grunulaitė told BNS.

Business doesn't think the new regime will increase tax collection

Business representatives believe that smart cash registers will not make a big difference in tax collection.

„Who is that person out there fooling? What kind of taxes are you going to collect from him? This is information that nobody needs. What will the IRS do with that accounting? How many potatoes, eggs or mushrooms did that lady sell? (...) This is just a load on the state apparatus," V. Butkevičius, head of the association "Lithuanian Marketplaces and Markets", told BNS.

„The criterion of reasonableness has been exceeded and these excessive measures are already starting to reduce the number of small entrepreneurs, because young people are simply abandoning this form of business because it is unattractive – there are too many requirements“, – added V. Butkevičius.

„No more taxes will be collected and we said the same thing to VMI – there will not be a big (...) extraction of money from the shadow“, – D. Matukienė told BNS.

At the moment, VMI argues that the new regime will reduce tax evasion.

„The real-time transmission of cash register data will allow for a more accurate identification of risky taxpayers and improve business supervision, thus ensuring a higher collection of state budget revenues“, – says L. Grunulaitė.

In addition, she said, the new procedure reduces the administrative burden, as accounting is digitalised, so there is no longer a need to buy and fill in a cash register, and there is no longer a need to go to a VMI office, as the registration activities can be carried out remotely.

As BNS reported, the government in April rejected a proposal by the Social Democrats in the Seimas to postpone the obligation to use new cash registers for two years, until May 2027. At the time, the Ministry of Finance said that businesses had four years to prepare for the change, and the delay would allow unscrupulous businesses to manipulate the data.