Lawyers are not exempt from accounting records

He General Manager of Revenue, Publio De Graciadenied that lawyers are exempt from the obligation to keep accounting records, as announced in a news release on Monday afternoon.

According to the official, it is held meetings with lawyers receive proposals for a regulation that will regulate the law on accounting records, which is why they are not exempt from this procedure.

He explained that in those conversations such a decision was not agreed upon or made and that the law and its regulations determine the processes and obligations of resident agents to know and have access to records.

“Some information is accounting records that we lawyers we must be aware of his position and in the event that the General Administration of Revenue requests them, as a result of the request of one of the countries of the global forum, they must be divided”, explained De Gracia.

He reminded that it has been almost 10 years Panama has committed to exchange data for tax purposes.

De Gracia reported that October 15 was the date for resident agents to declare that they had them or to be notified where the accounting information was, however, A decision on extending the deadline will be sent until the end of the year.

The message of the director of the tax administration, published on his social networks, provoked the comments of a lawyer familiar with the subject, Armando Maestre, whosigns that the responsibility for accounting records is any company engaged in commercial transactions and not from an accountant or outside lawyer who has nothing to do with them.

“It follows a small game of outside organizations,” Maestre wrote.

For his part, lawyer Rolando Caballero thought so The problem with the obligation is that it confuses the function of a company’s resident agent with commercial activities which legal entities can achieve.