Without any “brake,” the runaway course of taxpayers’ overdue debts to the Tax Office continues, with an additional 9.86 billion euros added to the “books” within a year, further swelling the major problem of “red” debts.
Despite collections and write-offs of total debts amounting to 14.52 billion euros (last November, debts of 5.51 billion euros concerning K.B.S fines of one debtor were written off as uncollectible), the total overdue balance at the end of July 2026 stood at 109.77 billion euros, a development also linked to the pressure faced by households, self-employed professionals, and businesses from the energy crisis and inflation more generally.
With the new write-off of 5.51 billion euros, uncollectible debts rose to 30.50 billion euros, accounting for 27.78% of the total overdue balance.
Of the theoretically collectible debt of approximately 80 billion euros (79.27 billion), only 6.70% of the actual overdue balance is under settlement, a percentage corresponding to 5.31 billion euros.
According to the quarterly report of the State Budget Office in Parliament (GPKB), which analyzes the data of the Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE), the final result of the 109.77 billion euro overdue debt balance arises from: new overdue debts amounting to 9.86 billion euros, plus overdue debts as of 1/8/2026 that were certified later amounting to 2.60 billion euros, and minus collections and write-offs, which total 14.52 billion euros.
In absolute numbers, the total overdue balance at the end of last July appears reduced by 2.06 billion euros compared with July 2025.
Examining the qualitative structure of the actual overdue balance, the GPKB finds that 66.46% of it, corresponding to 52.69 billion euros, stems from tax debts.
The remainder of the actual overdue debts comes from other categories of debt, which show a low collection rate.
These include fines (tax and non-tax), which make up 21.84% of the actual overdue balance, as they amount to 17.31 billion euros, and non-tax debts (loans, court costs, assessments, etc.), which make up 11.70% of the actual overdue balance, a percentage corresponding to 9.27 billion euros.
Taking into account that 8.12 billion euros of the tax debts stem from insolvent debtors and 18.45 billion euros concern debts with installment due dates beyond the last decade, 26.12 billion euros of debts remain, from which 91.99% of collections arise.
That is, almost all collections come from just 32.95% of the actual overdue balance.
Further analyzing the tax debts included in the actual overdue balance (52.69 billion euros), it is found that the largest percentage (47.18%) concerns VAT, as the debts amount to 24.86 billion euros. Income tax follows with a percentage of 42.22%, while property taxes record a low percentage of 5.23% since they include debts amounting to 2.76 billion euros.
4 million taxpayers with debts
Regarding the total number of debtors, at the end of July 2026 a decrease of 16,682 persons (natural and legal) is observed compared with the corresponding period of 2025, resulting in a total of 3,985,112 debtors.
This decrease comes to a large extent from the lower debt categories (up to 3,000 euros), with the number of debtors decreasing by 68,120 persons.
Compared with the month of June, there was a significant increase of 129,337 debtors compared with the corresponding figure on 1/7/2026, mainly due to the significant increase in the number stemming from debts in the Income and VAT categories. The increase observed was due to the expiration of the 1st installment of FEFP.
The few owe the many
Examining the distribution of debtors and the total overdue balance, it is found that almost all debts (96.43%) stem from the category above 10,000 euros. In particular, in the debt range above 1 million euros, 74.36% of the total overdue balance is concentrated, and only 0.26% of debtors.
By contrast, 89.77% of debtors are concentrated in debts up to 10,000 euros, with their total overdue balance amounting to 3.57% of total debts.
Natural and legal persons
The largest part of the debts comes from businesses. Specifically, the debts of natural persons make up 39.76% of the total, amounting to 43.65 billion euros, while the debts of legal persons stand at 66.12 billion euros, an amount corresponding to 60.24% of the total.
Analyzing the debt data of natural and legal persons by debt range, it is found that in the low debt categories almost the entire overdue balance comes from natural persons.
It is indicative that 97.88% of debts below 50 euros and 88.15% of debts below 10,000 euros stem from natural persons. Correspondingly, the number of natural persons who owe less than 50 euros corresponds to 88.70% of debtors in this debt category, while for debts below 10,000 euros the number of natural persons stood at the end of July 2026 at 3,229,092 individuals, constituting 90.27% of the total for this specific debt range.
By contrast, as the amount of debts increases, the role of legal persons in shaping the overdue balance is also strengthened. Specifically, in the category of overdue balance above 1 million euros, legal persons account for 68.28% of the debts, with their overdue balance reaching 55.73 billion euros at the end of July 2026.
Correspondingly, the number of legal persons owing more than 1 million euros stood at 6,554, constituting 62.71% of the number of debtors in this debt range.
Under settlement
Regarding debt settlement, only 6.70% of the actual overdue balance is under settlement, a percentage corresponding to 5.31 billion euros. The highest percentage of total settled debts (18.44%) is found in the range from 10,001 to 100,000 euros, while within this range the percentage of settled debts reaches 19.82% for amounts from 20,001 to 50,000 euros.
However, the percentages differ between natural and legal persons. Specifically, the highest percentage of settled debts of natural persons is found between 500 and 10,000 euros (16.63%) and reaches 19.48% for amounts from 2,000 to 3,000 euros.
By contrast, legal persons settle at a higher percentage (25.70%) debts that belong to the range from 10,001 to 100,000 euros, while this percentage reaches 27.15% in the category from 10,001 to 20,000 euros.
Low debt settlement rates are observed both for low debt amounts (especially below 500 euros) and for high debt amounts (above 50,000 euros for natural persons and above 300,000 euros for legal persons).