Our national sport: cheating the taxman!

When you live in a country where a hardworking person is taxed 56% of his monthly income, it's no wonder they'll try their best at cheating the taxman in any way possible. Because, on top of this monthy amount we already pay, we still run the chance of getting taxed after the end of the calendar year - well, some people get money back, but they are not many!

We all pay 'in black' when we have the possibility, and we just 'forget' to mention we have done renovations, for instance. Because when you do renovations to your house or flat, you come into a higher category of taxing. You also pay 21% of VAT of work you are having done.

Yes, Belgians are extremely clever when it comes to taxes, but sometimes you can be too clever...

A few wiseguys thought they found THE way of avoiding to pay a lot of taxes! They own a company which produces calculators and cash registers. They are very advanced in their field, and not so long ago they claimed to have manufactured the only cash register which made it impossible to evade taxes...

They sold their new cash register to lots of restaurants, bars, shops, ... But what they did  not make public was that their salesmen told their clients how to cheat effectively with this new toy. It was just a way of getting into the software program, and then you could easily let 'disappear' 180 € of the 200 you received. All in the pocket, the taxman would not ask any questions.

Of course, such schemes don't last forerver. Also the tax service has become computer-aware and have their own division that tries to fight fraude. Their people discovered the scam and now the owners of this company have been arrested. And in the near future, lots of restaurants, shops etc. may expect a visit from the taxing services...