MCI Conducted Inspection Campaigns Covering 2,982 Institutions in Different Regions of the Kingdom
The Ministry of Commerce and Investment carried out comprehensive inspection campaigns to control and detect the violators of the Anti-Commercial Concealment Law in the home and office furniture sector in the Kingdom. The campaigns resulted in the inspection of 2982 furniture trading establishments, and 341 violations were detected under Anti-Commercial Concealment Law. The owners were summoned by MCI for investigation and questioning, due to the suspicion of a commercial cover up, after detecting a number of evidences and documents. These cases will be referred to the Bureau of Investigation and Public Prosecution, and then to be referred to the Bureau of Grievances to issue the final judgment and verdict.
During the inspection campaign, MCI judicial control officers monitored a number of illegal labors in some shops. They were referred to the competent authorities for taking the legal measures against them.
It is worth mentioning that the Ministry had launched the National Program for Combating the Commercial Concealment, as part of its initiatives in the National Transformation Program 2020, which is based on 6 main measures for combating and eliminating any commercial concealment practices, which are considered one of the main causes of commercial fraud and raising the level of unemployment.
These measures including monitoring the fund sources by imposing the opening of bank accounts for any commercial establishment, also the need to deal with invoices, which may reduce foreign remittances, as well as the need of obtaining accurate information on the violating business practices for each sector, including the necessary treatment for combating the commercial concealment and stimulating the investment, in addition to upgrading the level of service provided to the consumer, further more having coordination among government agencies to consolidate the efforts to combat the cover up, besides having nationalization of jobs, and providing fair competition in the trade sector to make the Saudi market an attractive environment for investors.
Meanwhile, the Ministry endeavors to combat the commercial concealment in all sectors and trade activities through several stages, starting with the retail sector and then the construction sector, since these two sectors constitute the highest percentage of the cover up cases, followed by other sectors.
MCI aims to eliminate the phenomenon of commercial concealment and to create a commercial environment free from irregularities, and to enable the citizens of finding and doing business.
MCI has been endeavoring to monitor and seize any cases relevant to commercial cover up, and to apply the anti-concealment regulations, which may reach to two years' imprisonment, a fine of 1 million riyals for each offender, deporting the non-Saudis from the Kingdom, in addition to defaming the names of violators in local newspapers at their own expense, besides closing the commercial activity and writing off the C.R. and the prohibition of practicing the same business for up to five years.