Over 2,700 companies in Galaţi ceased operations

More than 2,700 companies in Galaţi ceased their operation in the first semester of 2009, Marian Filimon, head of the Professional Association of Small and Medium Enterprises in Galaţi said on Monday, for Agerpres.

Out of the aforementioned number of companies, 2,240 companies temporarily suspended their operations as a result of the introduction of the lump sum tax, but according to Mr. Filimon, the number of companies that will suspend their operations following the introduction of this tax will soon near 2,900. "It was a rushed decision, and no studies were made on the impact it would have", Filimon said.

The first semester of 2009 saw 58 companies close down and 442 companies enter bankruptcy, 61 more than last year.

The Trade Register of Galaţi still has 28,492 companies on record (22,353 companies, 34 cooperative companies and 6.105 natural certified persons.

According to Mr. Filimon, "life isn"t too rosy" for the managers of companies that weathered the crisis either.

"There a lot of companies that are entering a liquidity crisis. We don"t have a statistic yet. Many of the managers that come to ask for our help are desperate due to the financial deadlock, which keeps payments between companies frozen, because the money circuit is broken. There are payment orders, promissory notes and other legal means of payment that are simply worthless, because the companies that issued them haven"t been paid themselves. Another problem that companies are facing is VAT reimbursement. There are companies that have been waiting for months the reimbursement of hundreds of millions or even billions of lei. A more recent phenomenon: not even contracts with the state provide certainty anymore. There are construction and service companies that have contracts with the state, which they won through fair and transparent auctions, who are now on the brink of bankruptcy because the state hasn"t paid the works that have been delivered", the head of the Professional Association of Small and Medium Enterprises in Gala i.

According to Nicolae Filimon, "the government"s tax policy and the economic crisis have decimated the companies in Galaţi, and the future is getting even gloomier, because a lot of companies are going insolvent because of the financial deadlock".