Ticket clearing house comes under investigation for tax evasion and more

Published: 12/1/1999

The Russian federal tax police is claiming that the Russian ticket clearing house, the Transport Clearing Chamber (TCC) owes more than Rb 14m in taxes. It is currently investigating TCC procedures and may according to reports take the management to court. Ironically, TCC's role is to protect airlines from unfair ticket sales practices by sales agents. According to Sergey Ilichev, President of the TCC, the majority of Russian air carriers work with TCC, with 75% of all ticket sales being cleared by the chamber. TCC signs agreements both with airlines and travel agencies. The agencies sell tickets using TCC documentation, revenues are paid into TCC accounts and then to the airlines. The check by the tax police revealed that most of the funds handled by TCC had not been declared as taxable. The authorities allege that a "holding" account containing revenues derived from ticket sales is used not to pay the airlines, but is diverted to fuel suppliers, airports and other bodies. It further alleges that some of the money may be siphoned off into foreign bank accounts. Russian newspaper Segodnya reports that it has established that, in 1998, Rb 15 billion ($ 1.5 billion) went through such a holding account. The tax police will now investigate airline records, starting with Vnukovo Airlines, Russia second largest carrier. According to Vnukovo, some Rb 9 billion ($0.9 billion) went through the TCC, while it got back just Rb 0.5 billion ($0.05 billion). TCC denies any illegal activities and has taken the tax police to court, demanding that the charges are dismissed. The general dissatisfaction and accusations of misadministration relating to the Russian clearing system has been around for some time and many of the country"s airlines have expressed like Vnukovo, quite publicly, some such as Sibir, have even set up their own directly owned distribution networks, to avoid dealing with the TCC.

Article ID: 1155