The head of the personal income administration department of the State Revenue Committee, Dina Kussainova, reported that in 2023, the volume of mobile transfers in Kazakhstan reached nearly 80 trillion tenge, as conveyed by a correspondent from the business information center Kapital.kz.
“Looking at the National Bank's overall transfer data, the total volume of payments for goods and services across the country for 2023 amounted to only 55.3 trillion tenge, while the volume of transfers was almost 80 trillion tenge. Therefore, the focus is on those (entrepreneurs - Ed.) who receive (payments - Ed.) through mobile transfers and underreport their income. There is administrative liability for entrepreneurs who refuse to accept payments using payment cards. The first offense results in a warning; for repeated violations, there is a fine of 40 monthly calculation indicators or 157,280 tenge,” she noted.
The head of the department clarified that the order from the Minister of Finance to monitor mobile transfers was issued back in 2022. The criterion is that an individual receives funds from 100 or more different people into a bank account not intended for entrepreneurial activities over each of three consecutive calendar months.
“There is a lot of information about mobile transfers right now, some of which is inaccurate. I would like to clarify: the amount does not matter here; what matters is the number of people. If there are more than 100 people for three consecutive months, only then does the individual come under scrutiny,” emphasized Dina Kussainova.
Entrepreneurs often underreport their income. According to a representative of the State Revenue Committee, if we look at the statistics, 76% of entrepreneurs reported earnings of less than 5 million tenge over the first half of 2024.
“Let’s calculate: 5 million tenge for half a year divided by six months, then by 30 days, means daily revenue should be only 27,000 tenge. Which store near your house has a revenue of just 27,000 tenge? Entrepreneurs themselves underreport their income to optimize expenses,” believes the head of the State Revenue Committee.