Italy: monster tax on national and foreign boats ?

charles_reed

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Yesterday, the Italian Government announced the (another) new economic mesures; during the press conference they announced taxes on planes, sports cars and boats.


There is no official detail yet (not even in the Govt web site), but rumours abound of a tax which will be levied starting May 2012 to all boats, national and foreign, sailing, anchoring or mooring inside the territorial waters.

The brackets would be as follows

No tax for LOA under 10m
10.01 - 12m --> 7 euro a day
12-14m --> 12 euro a day
14-17 --> 40 euro a day
17-24 --> 75 euro a day
>24m --> 150 euro a day

50% reduction for boats kept on the hard.



Someone may remember a few years ago Sardinia introduced a similar tax.



**Just a (persistent) rumour for the moment** , it looks so suicidal to defy reason, I will add more as official news come out.



Should it prove true, if anyone wants to secure a berth in Croatia, Ionian Greece or Corsica.. better hurry up
Monster tax only on monster boats.

In reply to James Marinero - the Guardia di Finanza are a crack body and if it's law and if it's executed I'd give you 1:10 chance of not having to pay, they were set up when Italians paying VAT were a joke - not so now.

Though I'd agree with your other points, especially about Greece.
 

BrianH

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Monster tax only on monster boats.

Don't underestimate the accumulative cost of this daily tax.

I've just had a mail from my Italian friend in Lignano, north-east Italy. He reports total panic among boat-owners in the area of many lagoon-based, large marinas. There is already an exodus of the larger boats eastwards across the Adriatic looking for berths in Slovenia and Croatia.
 

BrianH

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Originally Posted by LadyInBed
So will marina prices go down to attract new customers or will prices go up to to keep the bottom line above water level
First principles, Clarice: simplicity. When demand increases, the same happens to prices.

Presumably LadyInBed was referring to the departed marinas. This old cynic doesn't expect them to do anything but rise, which is why I have just paid my annual berth fee for 2012 three months early.

Too soon to say but this could be a re-run of when Italy bowed to pressure from Brussels and the Guardia di Finanza started to control EU-registered boats for VAT - an armada set sail across the Adriatic. Then Slovenia acceded and immediately began the same checks - a mini-armada set sail south. That, plus the vast build-up of Croatian charter fleets, is why there are so few spare marina berths in Croatia. That could change when Croatia achieves EU status in 2013.

So I don't expect many of those would-be emigrants to find anywhere vacant. Time for Albania to start building marinas.
 
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jimbaerselman

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Nah, just move to Greece. They haven't woken up to this tax thing yet....
Well, they've had the law which allows a €4 per day charge on 12m boats since 1984, but they just haven't yet worked out how to gather it economically. An entry charge, based on how many days the boat planned to spend in Greece would be one way. Or make the 30 day port police visit a time to collect €120 for all 30 days.

Those permanently based on one place can pay an annual fee . . . and many do.
 

SHUG

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I was in Sardinia when the daily tax was levied on boats over 14m unless you could demonstrate that you were marina based.. As the Sardinians are very tax-averse it wasn't collected with much enthusiasm. It cost about 3million euro to collect and the revenue was about 1.2million euro.
It was scrapped not just for this reason but also because boats were going to Corsica where there was no tax.
 

Seadawg33

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I have heard rumour that the legislation has passed. My boat is right at 10 meters. If I installed a hydraulic backstay and cranked it up really tight when they measure my boat I bet I could banana the boat to 9.9 meters. Alternatively I could take an inch off of the bow or the stern to shorten her. I guess I will start calling my boat 9.9 meters.
 

MapisM

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Another alternative might be to check better how the new tax works.
You might discover that it applies from 10.01 meters onward...
Does that count as a Xmas gift? :)

PS: incidentally, where are you based? In my marina there's a US flagged sailboat which is just about 10m long!
 
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Beadle

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Just thinking with my fingers on the keyboard about the stiff late payment charge:

So there I am, 5 days at anchor somewhere in Italian waters and the tax collector turns up on day 5 - does that mean I am 4 days late? If so I'd be sending off my daily payment via Bottle Post!

Or I'm just out of cash and there is no ATM in the nearest village, what now? Will he be able to debit one of my banking / credit cards at the anchorage?

Interesting times ahead!

I would suggest that it is your problem not his

He will "impound" your boat until you get the cash - charging for every extra day.

Even worse for you because you will have to pay the tax on each hull!
 

MapisM

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Mapism my boat is located about 5 nm from the Bay of La Spezia on the Magra River. I hope that the tax does not apply to 10m boats. That would be a nice Christmas present indeed. Where are you located?
Yep, indeed no tax on 10.00 m LOA boats.
But I would just suggest to keep onboard some proof of the boat LOA.
If she's CE certified, you should have a declaration of conformity where the hull length is reported: that's the magic number.

Myself, I'm based in southern Sardinia, so obviously the boat I had in mind isn't yours.
I hope you didn't have problems with the recent floodings on Magra River, I was told that some boats were damaged. :(
 
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