Yandex Go provides a taxi hire service through a mobile application in more than ten cities of Uzbekistan. After the fact that this large service did not pay taxes in Uzbekistan on its income caused public objections, in November the Tax Committee appealed to the legal owner of the company – Ridetech International, registered in the Netherlands, and demanded that the service become a tax resident of Uzbekistan, giving a deadline for this until December 1, otherwise the platform warned about blocking. 

On December 1, the Tax Committee reported that Yandex Go has become a tax resident of Uzbekistan and tax collection will now begin. 

“Starting from December 1 of this year, the Yandex Go service will be provided by the legal entity “YandexGo UB” LLC, a tax resident in the territory of the Republic of Uzbekistan. From this date, the Yandex Go service will conduct its calculations based on the requirements of the legislation of the Republic of Uzbekistan, submit primary documents and tax reports, and pay the specified taxes. Ridetech International B.V. notified the tax committee through an official letter,” the committee said. 

Kun.uz asked the Tax Committee: “Is Yandex Go paying the profit tax, VAT, dividends and other taxes due from December 1, 2023?” 

According to the information service of the Committee, in accordance with the Tax Code, Yandex Go, like all taxpayers, was a payer of VAT on the turnover of goods, profit tax on the profit received, and dividend tax when dividends were calculated from it. It is necessary to submit reports on taxes (VAT by 20.01.2024, profit tax by 01.03.2024 and by the 20th of the month following the month in which the dividend was calculated) and make the payment by this date. 

The tax committee added that information on the taxes paid by the taxpayer and his existing debt can be made public by the tax authority. 

Kun.uz asked the Tax Committee: “Yandex Taxi service has been operating in Uzbekistan for more than 5 years. Is it possible to recalculate unpaid taxes during this period?” 

“In 2018-2023, 25.3 billion soums of taxes were calculated into the budget by the organizations that signed a contract with Yandex Go as tax agents. Tax agents are currently conducting control activities on the complete and correct calculation of taxes,” the committee said. 

Yandex Go’s office in Uzbekistan informed Kun.uz that starting from December 1, customers who paid by bank cards will receive a receipt through the application. But a receipt is not issued when payment is made in cash. 

According to the Tax Committee, the integration work with Yandex Go and the Fiscal data operator has been completed and a virtual fiscal module has been created with a certificate for transition to the main operating mode. With these methods, it is possible to create and transfer cashless and cash receipts. 

“Yandex Go makes it possible to issue receipts in the form of cash through the virtual cash register module. It should be noted that there are a number of issues that are waiting for their solution. In particular, creating the possibility of creating a fiscal check when paying by cash, integrating all aggregators, including local aggregators in the regions, with the fiscal data operator. In this direction, relevant work is being continued by the tax authorities. Additional information on the achieved results will be provided,” the committee stated in its official information provided to Kun.uz. 

The commission fee collected from drivers has been increased 

Economist Otabek Bakirov noted that Yandex Go has recently increased the share of the service commission it takes from taxi drivers from 13% to 14.6%. He also wrote that a number of partner taxi parks of the company also increased their share from 4-5% to 5-6%. 

“After December 1, the share that taxi drivers receive for the provided service has decreased to 2.6 percent. So, Yandex Go and some of its partners put the burden of the taxes they want to pay in Uzbekistan on the shoulders of drivers,” the economist wrote. 

Yandex Go confirmed that the amount of its commission was increased, but taxi parks also denied that their commissions were increased, saying that the amount of fees charged by them, on the contrary, decreased. 

“From December 1, Yandex Go services will be provided by an Uzbekistan company. This will further simplify processes for partners, their drivers and services. 

In connection with the transfer to a legal entity operating in Uzbekistan, the VAT paid to the country’s budget is added to the service price. At the same time, existing tariffs within the service will be revised to keep the drivers' income at the current level. 

We know that some partners have already reduced their commissions because they no longer need to pay VAT for working with non-residents,” the official statement submitted to Kun.uz reads. 

Gazeta.uz confirmed that some partner taxi parks of Yandex Go have reduced the commission from 0.5% to 1%, and some taxi companies have not yet changed the tariff, but they may consider this issue. 

Kun.uz contacted the information service of the Competition Committee several times to get a comment regarding this case. But so far, no official response has been given. 

For more information, below are some screenshots posted by drivers on social media: