Impact of Fee Changes in Lebanon: Budget Revisions and Financial Realities

Report by Petra Abou Haidar, English adaptation by Nadine Sassine 

 

Finally, the new budget has been released, and according to this budget, all the fees we used to pay to the state will change. So what are these fees, and how will their costs be affected?

Let's start with the attestations, meaning all documents that need authentication from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to be sent abroad from Lebanon.

 

These documents include personal status documents like births, marriages, divorces, deaths, individual and family extracts, educational certificates, driving licenses, insurance certificates, bank statement certificates, employment certificates, experience certificates, general and special powers of attorney, commercial registrations, certificates of origin, and others.

 

The cost of these attestations has increased 20 times from 50,000 Lebanese pounds to 1 million Lebanese pounds per attestation, which is the price of the required stamp.

If we talk numbers, the cost you will pay now for authentication on any document will be less than what you used to pay before, if you calculate it in dollars. For example, 50,000 Lebanese pounds used to be around $34, while now 1 million Lebanese pounds is approximately $11. So, it's less than half of what we used to pay.

 

This contributes to the state missing out on additional revenues. However, we shouldn't forget that this step is unjust to many because salaries for a large portion of Lebanese, especially those in the public sector and military and security apparatuses, haven't been adjusted as they should and are much lower than before the crisis, if calculated in dollars.

So, as important as this step is for the state's treasury, it is equally difficult for these people, especially in the absence of a comprehensive plan to get out of the crisis we are currently facing.