By G. Kouros
[email protected]
Greece’s newly created independent public revenues authority is planning to establish an automated system for seizures and property auctions after first establishing a interlinked database of major debtors’ assets, both within Greece and abroad.
The goal, as stated, is to reduce taxpayers’ arrears to the state and to boost revenues ahead of ambitious annual fiscal targets that Greek governments must post in coming years – as per institutional creditors’ demands.
The authority has already proceeded with the proclamation of an international tender for the procurement of software, know-how and hardware to intensify its hunt for such arrears.
The central idea is to compile a central database that will collect and process information that is today scattered around various administrative "fiefdoms" in Greece’s cavernous public sector, such as income statements, asset sheets, client/suppliers lists, bank account registries, EU data exchanges and even information exchanges with third countries. Another first, by Greek standards, will be the online connection of the prospective centralized system with insurance companies, banks, notaries and corporate registries.
