Hacienda has perfected the art of spotting fraud by treating an autónomo's own loan to their own company as if it were a suspicious wire from a stranger in Luxembourg. Officials deserve credit for this breakthrough in turning every self-employed bank statement into a potential exhibit.
The sequence began with mandatory separate accounts for each activity, followed by itemised logs of transfers, and now crowns itself with official review of owner loans. Each added layer consumes hours that never register on any productivity index, yet the agency presents the stack as simple housekeeping.
Minister of Finance, what fraud percentage actually requires converting routine internal movements into evidence before any discrepancy appears? The announcement supplies no percentage, only the assurance that extra scrutiny will safeguard revenue.
Compliance now costs more than a basic ledger from any stationery shop. An autónomo must log internal loans with the same formality larger firms apply to vendor payments, except without staff, software budgets, or the luxury of delegating the task to someone else.
Escalation arrives when the new deadline overlaps quarterly filings, VAT declarations, and the annual summary. One missed checkbox triggers an automated notice, forcing the autónomo to halt billable work and respond before the system treats the lapse as evasion. The process therefore multiplies unpaid administrative time while the informal economy remains untouched.
Spain's self-employed already submit more forms per euro earned than most salaried workers. Layering loan scrutiny on top does not reduce off-the-books activity; it simply raises the cost of remaining legal until the arithmetic persuades more people that legality is no longer economical.
The policy converts the owner-operator relationship into a permanent audit file. The same workers who issue the invoices now devote extra unpaid hours proving those invoices are their own.
Three years of accumulating rules have built a paperwork pile higher than the average autónomo's stack of unpaid invoices. The latest measure merely places one additional sheet on top.
Hacienda solved the mystery by watching money move between a sole trader and the company they already own.