Ministry of Labor and SAT call to avoid tax fraud in labor matters

Companies that are not in force in the Public Register of Specialized Services Contractors or Specialized Works (REPSE) and offer services will be penalized for tax and labor purposes, as established by the 2021 labor reform, the Ministry of Labor and Welfare announced. Social (STPS) and the Tax Administration Service (SAT).

In order to remind employers that they cannot contract services that are outside the new rules, the agencies detailed that in accordance with article 1004-C of the Federal Labor LawFailure to comply with said provisions will impose a fine of 2,000 to 50,000 times the Measurement and Update Unit (UMA).

“Individuals and legal entities that contract specialized services or works are reiterated to carry out said contracting exclusively with companies with current registration in the REPSE Register, of the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS). The page of the activity that appears in the registration notice of the provider of specialized services or works and the approximate number of workers who will execute said services must be indicated in the contract for the provision of specialized services or works”, indicates the information disseminated by the dependencies.

In this sense, they reiterated their commitment to the correct application of tax provisions and the prohibition that natural and legal persons have to provide and contract specialized services or works that are part of their corporate purpose and their predominant economic activity of the contracting party.

The labor specialist of the consultancy Deloitte, Germán de la Garza de Vecchi, commented that “we have observed that we are already in the punitive stage of the reform (of subcontracting), we see that the SAT reviews are carried out to confirm that the services that are considered specialized, in fact they are”.

For his part, Héctor Márquez Pitol, president of the Mexican Association of Human Capital Companies (AMECH) said that “despite the fact that more than two years have passed since the changes made to the labor reform, many leaders still do not understand the difference between the figure of “outsourcing” and “Specialized Services”. While these two concepts share some similarities, each pursues different ends.”

In this sense, he explained that in our country, the Specialized Services were created in order to eradicate bad practices in the labor market in terms of subcontracting and promote formality, and for which there is a registry before the labor authority.

Hence, the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare and the SAT highlighted that companies or individuals that do not have the REPSE registration, and that contract these services will not be able to deduct or credit the payments they have made for the contracted works or services.

Currently there are more than 120,000 companies with the Registry of Specialized Service Providers or Specialized Works (Repse).