OFFICERS FROM the PSP and representatives from the tax office carried out inspections at 89 businesses in the Cascais area recently, uncovering a large number of offences ranging from tax evasion to unemployment benefit fraud.
A PSP spokesman confirmed that the investigations took place last week and were carried out in co-operation with inspectors from the social security and commercial tax authorities, as well as the employment service. Impromptu inspections were carried out on a range of businesses, including restaurants, clothes shops, pharmacies, butchers, hairdressers, jewellers and newsagents, all in the Cascais area.
In all, the authorities uncovered 13 cases of tax evasion, three of unemployment benefit fraud, 12 false income declarations and three cases of failure to display business opening hours. In addition, the police discovered five establishments failing to display the mandatory sale of alcohol guidelines, one business which had failed to send in a copy of its complaints book and six with discrepancies relating to customer bills and company receipts. Officers also impounded a vehicle together with its contents and took down 37 tax numbers and 100 social security numbers for cross reference with official records.
