The news portal Magazine interface has published a extensive interview a Antonio ballester in which he highlights as head the fifteen years he has been leading the office tomarial and it also highlights one of his phrases: "I miss tax incentives for companies that invest and create jobs." In the introduction to the interview, he explains that Tomarial's model from the beginning was "to combine the excellence of the big oven with the closeness and personal treatment towards customers. Its model has been consolidated into a boutique firm that is a reference in Valencia and has not stopped growing, adding professionals and expanding its range of specialized services for companies.»
The managing partner of the firm believes that in this time «Tomarial has met and exceeded our expectations. It has been an exciting journey, a very enriching experience fifteen years later, of course it has. I would like to highlight the role that the team has played in this growth, a team that has also been growing and that has accompanied us. Our original idea was to offer the quality guaranteed by large firms, where Tomás and I had worked, combining excellence with greater proximity to customers, closeness, availability... We have done it since we were born». Antonio Ballester details in the interview how Tomarial has always opted for growth from the human team: «We have made a great effort to offer a professional career to our lawyers, investing heavily in their training, betting on giving them more and more responsibility and devoting many hours to the personal aspect of the human team. If the team does not grow, it is impossible for an office to improve.»
It also highlights to Interface the areas that have developed the most in recent years: "since the pandemic, the labor legal department has experienced great growth: the ERTE, all the legislation that has existed in labor matters since then... The companies demanded more services and we have responded. I would also highlight in recent times all the advice on insolvency and restructuring. Our tax area has not stopped growing since our birth and is the one that brings together the most professionals in Tomarial, the one that generates the most business. And the area of regulatory compliance, which has had a lot of momentum since the criminal liability of legal persons was established. The preventive criminal protocol is no longer exclusive to large companies and is already being implemented by SMEs, who realize the protection it provides them and how necessary it is to have it. For a couple of years we have also been commissioned compliance tax."
In his answers to the interviewer, Antonio Ballester focuses on the challenge that the pandemic marked for companies and their advisory needs. For this reason, the firm's commitment to technology: «At any time in this office there can be five simultaneous videoconferences between Tomarial professionals and their clients. And that is thanks to the expansion of the office, which has allowed us to have five rooms in the Europa Building equipped with the best audio and video technology. We are prepared for face-to-face attention for those who require it and also online, because the quality of these connections makes it comfortable: there is less and less difference between a virtual meeting and face-to-face.”
In tax matters, the firm's managing partner criticizes the “excessive dependence on final grants, which require a large administrative burden of time, effort and money, and which too often serve no purpose. He misses a system of tax incentives like the one that existed in the 80s and 90s on Corporate Tax, which allowed those who invested and created jobs to save taxes. Those were the two main deductions and they did not depend on any subsidy: they rewarded whoever was creating wealth with a simpler and better system. Deductions have been eliminated, such as the one for environmental investments, which was a good incentive for sustainability. Companies and entrepreneurs feel that they pay a lot of taxes and more in the Valencian Community. We are the leading community, we have the highest marginal rate in personal income tax: adding the state and regional section it stands at 54%. At some point the Constitutional Court has said that a lien above 50% can be considered confiscatory.”
Among the measures that he points out to help SMEs, Ballester points out "a clear measure, which has fallen into oblivion, would be to request the government of the Generalitat Valenciana to eliminate the current ceiling of ten million euros in billing, which prevents applying the 99% reduction in transmissions by inheritance of family businesses. That in our business fabric is a barrier: there are many family companies that are not interested in raising their turnover above that figure if they have a transmission between generations on the horizon. Their growth is discouraged, with enormously burdensome charges for transmission by inheritance if they invoice more than ten million. It continues to be a resounding demand for support for SMEs and is in the hands of the Valencian Government. We must support the survival of generations of Valencian businessmen."
From this link you can read the complete interview in Interface.
