May 5, 2020 – Beware the Croatian inspector – a new series courtesy of Glas Poduzetnika (Voice of Entrepreneurs), highlighting a Croatian business reality that helps kill growth, profit, and entrepreneurship. The Great Dutch/Hungarian Sponge Deception
I have seen them operating all over the country over the last 18 years, the most feared visitors to Croatia’s cafes, restaurants, and other businesses – the Croatian inspector.
As with many corrupt countries, the role of the inspector should be to make sure that the rules are being adhered to in the particular area they specialize in – sanitary, fiscal, etc – but in reality, the prime motivation is to find ways to fill the State coffers and their own. Allegedly.
I heard SO many stories of inspections where perfectly run businesses end up paying thousands in fines, some of it justified, much of it grossly unfair. And there is an old truism here:
If the Croatian inspector comes to visit, he will find something, even if there is nothing there.
It is a subject that I have wanted to cover for years, but I never had quite the right material. Until now.
Huge thanks to those very proactive chaps at Glas Poduzetnika, who are really becoming a force for change to be reckoned with. A really great initiative. In one of their latest moves, they have been collecting some of their members’ experiences with the Croatian inspector, to highlight the issue and the realities of doing business in Beautiful Croatia.
Story #10: The Great Dutch/Hungarian Sponge Deception
I’ve collected a bunch of these stories over 30 years of entrepreneurship. I am currently in court, already in my third hearing, for an unproven and ridiculous sin worth less than 200 kn. I was also in the process for a declaration that, according to the inspector, did not cover the country of origin Netherlands because the goods came from Hungary (it was an international company that has factories in several countries). The declaration moved and on it stated one country, while below was shown another. So I was deceiving consumers who find it very important, whether the dish sponge is from a particular EU country. So I was in court with a threat to have the vehicle seized because the driver had loaded a meter of wood in the official car, etc. I was also punished by customs for 400 kn of non-existent debt (even though we pay hundreds of thousands of customs VAT and customs duties per month), I also paid taxes which in the tax office “popped up on the screen.” We definitely didn’t owe those, but we needed confirmation that we didn’t have a tax debt, etc.
Beware the Croatian Inspector is a new daily series (yes, there really is that much material) which you can follow here.
If you have a Croatian inspector story you would like to share with the Glas Poduzetnika team (in English or Croatian), you can do so via [email protected] Subject TCN inspector.
You can follow the 55,000+ others on the Glas Poduzetnika Facebook page.
