Parliament adopted a bill to amend and supplement a number of legal acts in the first reading. This provides that possession of the stamp required for business entities will no longer be mandatory, but will be optional, IPN reports.
Presenting the bill, Deputy Minister of Justice Eduard Serbenco said the obligation to possess the stamp increases the costs of registering a business by 200-300 lei. In external trade transactions, the stamp is a non-tariff barrier that hampers the export and import procedures.
“In the epoch of technological development, the use of stamp on the documents of business entities is no longer an element of safety. It is actually a rudimentary element,” said Eduard Serbenco. According to him, the annulment of the stamp forms part of the measures taken by the Government to simplify the regulations concerning entrepreneurial activity.
Socialist MP Vasile Bolea said he is not sure that the annulment of the stamp will simplify the registration and running of businesses. “The stamp costs, but not so much and is a credible element. If a business entity has to every time go to the notary to have the digital signature put on a document confirmed, this will have to pay more because the notarial services are expensive,” he stated.
A number of MPs, including Lib-Dem Chiril Lucinschi, inquired about the impact of the annulment of the stamp and how those will be done at practical level when reference to the stamp is made in about 100 regulations.
The head of the Parliament’s commission on economy, budget and finance Stefan Creanga, when presenting his report, recommended the MPs to support the bill. He noted that they should analyze things to see in relation to what institutions the stamp should not be annulled.
During the debates, Communist MP Oleg Reidman and other lawmakers said the banks will not accept documents from business entities that will lack the stamp.
Under the bill, the public authorities will continue to use the stamp mandatorily.
