During its session on May 18, the Senate approved a bill introducing remote tax audits to monitor compliance with mandatory digital product labeling regulations. The bill has now been forwarded to the President for signature.

Before initiating a remote audit, tax authorities will be required to issue two official warnings. These notifications will be sent directly to the personal electronic account of the taxpayer found in violation of the digital labeling rules.

The audit will be launched based on a formal order issued by the head of the tax authority or their deputy. This order must explicitly state the taxpayer's name and tax identification number (TIN), the names of the auditing officials, as well as the duration and specific objective of the audit.

The duration of a remote tax audit is strictly capped at five days. The process concludes on the day the audit report is transmitted as an electronic document to the taxpayer's personal account.

Furthermore, the tax authority must notify the taxpayer of the exact date, time, and venue for reviewing the audit findings at least two business days before the review takes place.

Any administrative decision resulting from the remote audit will take effect one month after it is delivered to the taxpayer via their personal account. The Cabinet of Ministers is set to approve the detailed regulations governing how these remote audits will be conducted.

The bill also introduces a tiered system of fines for manufacturers, importers, and retailers who violate mandatory digital labeling regulations. If a violation is detected through a remote tax audit, the penalties are structured as follows:

• First offense: 0.2% of net revenue from the last reporting quarter in which sales occurred;
• Second offense within a year: 0.4%;
• Third offense within a year: 1%;
• Fourth and subsequent offenses within a year: 2%.

Currently, any violation of labeling rules carries a flat fine of 2% of net revenue from the last reporting quarter in which sales took place, which spikes to 20% for a repeat offense.

Entrepreneurs have repeatedly argued that these fines are disproportionate to the infractions, which are often unintentional. The Business Ombudsman’s office previously warned that anchoring the penalty to total revenue could mean "absolute bankruptcy" for a company due to a single mistake by a retail clerk. Despite these concerns, billmakers chose to retain the revenue-linked calculation method.

However, in early May, Aziz Umirzakov, a department director at the Tax Committee, revealed that the President had initiated a reduction of these fines. While sanctions will be lowered for manufacturers, wholesalers, and importers of labeled goods, penalties for the food service and retail sectors will pivot away from revenue percentages entirely, shifting instead to fixed-sum fines.

In 2025, the turnover of digitally labeled goods reached 199 trillion UZS, marking a 33 trillion UZS (20%) increase compared to 2024.