The government proposes to change the law on tourism, the villas must be licensed, otherwise they will be fined

The government has proposed some changes in the law on tourism due to the non-declaration of the real number of rented rooms and the concealment of income. The government requires no entity to be allowed to rent a room or apartment to tourists if it does not have a special license from the Ministry of Tourism.

If an entity violates this law, it will be sanctioned with fines amounting to 150,000 ALL.

In the draft law, it is proposed that part of the accommodation structures are not only hotels, motels, resorts, campsites or rooms offered in agro-tourism, but also include apartments offered by citizens for the accommodation of tourists, which consist of a room, a kitchen and at least 1 toilet.

Also part of the list will be a block of apartments (2 or more) managed by the same tourist entrepreneur.

Likewise, the law proposes to include in the law the rooms that are rented out to vacationers, regardless of whether they are inside a residential building or a residential building.

Referring to the draft law, all these accommodation structures mentioned above must be registered with the NRC and within 30 days they must apply to receive a certificate from the Ministry of Tourism.

"Each tourist entrepreneur, who exercises the activity as an accommodation structure, within 30 days from the registration in the National Registration Center for the exercise of the activity as an accommodation structure, submits to the ministry responsible for tourism the request for the equipment with a categorization certificate, according to the criteria defined in the by-laws pursuant to this law. The certificate of categorization of the accommodation structure is indefinite and is registered in the Central Register of Tourism, which is administered by the ministry responsible for tourism. Each accommodation structure during the exercise of the activity has the obligation to carry out the electronic registration of customers with the data on the number of visitors, nights of stay, citizenship, residence, gender and age", it is stated in article 43 of this draft law.

Për të gjitha strukturat akomoduese që ushtrojnë aktivitetin pa marrë licencë pranë ministrisë do të aplikohen penalitete si më poshtë:

a)            Ushtrimi i veprimtarisë si strukturë akomoduese pa certifikatë kategorizmi, sipas nenit 43/1 dënohet me gjobë, bazuar në numrin e dhomave, si më poshtë:

i.              nga 1 deri në 5 dhoma me 20 000-50 000 lekë

ii.             nga 6 deri në 15 dhoma me 100 000 lekë;

iii.            nga 16 deri në 40 dhoma me 200 000 lekë:

iv.            nga 41 deri në 80 dhoma me 300 000 lekë;

v.             mbi 80 dhoma me 400 000 lekë.

b)            përdorimi i paautorizuar i shënjave dalluese në strukturën akomoduese, pa u kryer procesi i klasifikimit sipas nenit 45 dënohet me gjobë 200 000 lekë;

c) exercising the activity as agro-tourism without the corresponding certificate according to Article 45/1 is punishable by a fine, based on the number of rooms, as follows:

i. up to 5 rooms 50,000 ALL;

ii. over 5 rooms 100,000 ALL.

Due to the phenomenon that declared and undeclared accommodation structures do not report the number of visitors, the draft law proposes a fine for this violation as well.

"The non-declaration of statistical data by the accommodation structures on the number of visitors, the number of nights of stay, citizenship, residence, gender and age, according to Article 66, is punishable by a fine of 150,000 ALL", says the letter R of Article 71 .