Most of the companies not repaying Covid loans on the verge of bankruptcy

About 70 to 80 percent of the over 60,000 who haven’t started repaying their coronavirus debts to the Tax Authority face bankruptcy. Many companies that have begun repaying their deferred taxes are also behind on those payments, Michiel Hordijk, director of the Institute for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (IMK), told the Telegraaf.

At the end of April, Dutch businesses still owed the Tax Authorities 16.5 billion euros in coronavirus debts. Hordijk expects that at least 1.5 billion euros will never be repaid. “It is probably more towards 3 to 5 billion euros that the government will have to write off,” he told the newspaper.

The IMK helps companies decide whether they can continue or whether it is a better idea to stop. “Many of these entrepreneurs are struggling mentally. They are often relieved when we say their company cannot survive.” The IMK often works at the request of the Tax Authority or municipalities. The institute helps failing companies with restructuring arrangements and figuring out which debts they can still repay. “We consider everything that’s more than nothing.”

Struggling companies can make such arrangements with the Tax Authority for their coronavirus debt too, but the deadline is mid-June, state Secretary Marnix van Rij told parliament this week. Hordijk urged companies to do so. “The debt will not disappear, but the chance of a settlement will.”