The Israel Tax Authority is examining a report on income from private surgery carried out at hospitals in Israel and overseas. Surgeons on the Tax Authority's "operating table" include surgeons who carry out transplants in Israel and overseas, and plastic surgeons.
Last week, an indictment was filed with the Tel Aviv Magistrates Court against Yaakov Dayan, the manager of Ad-Al Holdings Ltd., which mediated between people need kidney transplants and people interested in selling a kidney, on charges of tax evasion in the amount of NIS 118 million in 1997-2007. The indictment, which followed an investigation by the Tax Authority's Diamond Unit and the Tel Aviv Assessor's Office, offers a glimpse into one of the Tax Authority's biggest campaigns of recent months: an examination of the profitable private surgery industry. "This is just the tip of the iceberg," a top Tax Authority source said.
The source added, "As part of the Tax Authority's routine activity, we are looking at all kinds of business activities carried out in Israel, but which people try to camouflage to make out that they were carried out by foreign companies. For months, we have been constantly gathering information from private hospitals to uncover the cases in which those engaged in private surgery - and we're talking about anyone along the chain - do not report their real income."
The source said that "those along the chain" include "doctors, anesthesiologists, technicians, and nurses. There are many people who report private surgery as freelancers, but some of them do not report all their income, which is where we enter the picture. We examine everything. Every place where income-producing activity is taking place, we should be there. The Tax Authority often goes for the unexpected things, and surgeons who carry out private surgeries do not always know that we are also present in the operating room."
The top Tax Authority source said that millions of shekels "change hands" at hospitals. "Private surgery, whether cosmetic surgery or life-saving surgery, such as organ transplants, is a niche with a lot of money in it."
The source said that the Tax Authority was surprised by the number of doctors and other parties involved in private surgery who did not report all their income, or who tried to conceal it with various excuses and claims that the income was made abroad or that the surgeries were carried out for free.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on September 2, 2013
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