MOSCOW, January 24 The State Duma adopted in the first reading a government bill on the transition from excise stamps to digital labeling of tobacco and excisable nicotine-containing products.
“The bill was developed as part of a set of measures to stop applying paper stamps to tobacco products with a transition to digital marking. The term “accounting and control special stamp” is being introduced for labeling tobacco and nicotine-containing products with a unique QR code that will be applied to the pack,” — Deputy Head of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation Alexey Sazanov explained at a meeting of the State Duma.
According to the bill, the term “accounting and control special mark” is introduced into the Tax Code. It refers to means of identification that exclude the possibility of counterfeiting and reuse — in fact, it will be a barcode applied to the packaging.
The proposed innovations will allow maintaining the powers of customs authorities to administer excise taxes on tobacco products imported from the EAEU countries. Control will also be ensured over the correct determination of the tax base for excise taxes on tobacco and nicotine-containing products.
If the size of the tax base determined by the taxpayer turns out to be less than the volume of products sold according to the state information system for monitoring the turnover of labeled goods, the tax base will be determined based on the data of this system.
The current version of the document assumes that the law will come into force on March 1, 2024, but not earlier than a month from the date of its official publication, and not earlier than the 1st day of the next tax period for excise taxes. However, by the second reading the date for the law's entry into force will be clarified.
«It is necessary to synchronize the adoption of this bill with the corresponding changes to the technical regulations for tobacco products, which also abolishes the requirement for labeling with paper stamps. Therefore, by the second reading we will certainly postpone the date of entry into force of this bill to May 1 or June 1 depending on the timing of the entry into force of the relevant changes in the technical regulations,” Sazanov said, answering questions from deputies.