Q: What is the tax treatment of costs of marketing actions (based on the Romanian law)? For instance, are costs of bonding events or additional attractions during conferences, trainings for clients treated as tax deductible?

 

A:According with art. 25 of the Fiscal Code, as a general rule, only the expenses made for the business purposes are deductible. In this respect, the following expenses are expressly provided as tax deductible: advertizing expenses (provided that a written contract is available), cost of supporting materials for advertizing purposes, the value of samples, marketing expenses, expenses with market researches and cost of participation to fairs and exhibits.

In our opinion the additional attractions of granting goods and services other than samples are considered to be protocol expenses. Protocol expenses are limitedly deductible to 2% from the profit (art. 25, para. (3), letter a) of the Fiscal Code).

Offering gifts with an individual value of more than 100 lei is considered to be sale of goods, therefore a standard VAT rate of 20% will be applicable.