Have you heard of the Unidade dos Grandes Contribuintes (UGC)? The UGC functions as a sort of ‘tax radar’ for Portugal’s wealthiest taxpayers. Currently, this unit of the Autoridade Tributária (AT) monitors more than five thousand families and companies.
What is the UGC?
The UGC was launched at the end of 2011 by the government of Pedro Passos Coelho (PSD-CDS/PP), initially focusing solely on corporate entities. It wasn’t until 2017, under the government of António Costa (PS), that it began to oversee individual taxpayers.
Taxpayers are monitored by this organic unit if their annual income exceeds 750,000 euros (which included 685 people in 2024), if they have movable and immovable assets over five million euros (340 cases), if someone shows signs of wealth matching these income or asset criteria (seven taxpayers), or if they have a direct relationship with companies also considered significant taxpayers (623).
As 53 individuals meet more than one of these criteria, the total number of monitored people in 2024 reached 1,602.
Among companies, the number under observation has been growing. According to the anti-fraud report in 2024, the UGC monitored 3,720 corporate entities that year, including banks, insurers, holding management companies, and investment organizations.
The government reports that in 2024, the tax revenue generated by these major contributors, individuals, and companies, “exceeded 27 billion euros,” representing “about 43% of the total budget execution” for the year. This figure excludes municipal taxes from these contributors.
What does the UGC do?
According to information available on the Finance Portal, the “mission of the Unidade dos Grandes Contribuintes is to ensure tax management relations with designated taxpayers, encourage and support voluntary compliance with tax obligations, and conduct inspection and tax justice actions towards them, within a new relationship model based on cooperation and transparency between the parties”.
“The vision of the Unidade dos Grandes Contribuintes, in the context of its mission, is to establish a cooperative, transparent, and good-faith relationship with major taxpayers to promote voluntary compliance with their tax obligations on time and at the correct amount, closely aligning with what is potentially required by law, thereby fostering trust in the tax system,” the AT states.
Unit appoints new director
Luís Ramos, formerly the deputy director, has been appointed director of the special unit of the Autoridade Tributária e Aduaneira (AT) dedicated to major taxpayers, as noted in an order published on Tuesday in the Diário da República.
The order, signed by Secretary of State for Fiscal Affairs Cláudia Reis Duarte, noted that the public recruitment and selection commission for public administration (Cresap) “did not have three candidates with merit to constitute the respective nomination proposal”.
Therefore, the name of Luís Pedro Coelho Ramos was proposed—Cresap deemed him suitable for the position—who has been a tax inspector since 2000.
With a degree in Accounting and Fiscal Administration and a master’s in Taxation, Luís Ramos formally replaces João Paulo Canedo, who had held the post since 2012. The competition was announced in April and was repeated, but only now has it concluded.
At the AT since 2000, he served as coordinator of the transfer pricing team between 2004 and 2006 and was the project manager for high-income taxpayer compliance from 2012 to 2014. For the past 10 years, he was deputy director of the Unidade dos Grandes Contribuintes, with delegated responsibilities in the areas of major taxpayer inspection and transfer pricing.
The newly published order is dated October 16 and takes effect from the 20th of this month.
