Brazil's federal tax authority, the Receita Federal, said on Tuesday (8) that it had identified and blocked more than R$ 1 billion in suspicious refund claims for salário-maternidade, the country's maternity pay benefit. According to the agency, the requests came from shell companies and other organizations that may have tried to obtain social security funds improperly, and intercepting them prevented losses to public coffers.
What the data showed
The block applies to the channel companies use to claim back maternity pay they advanced to employees; the benefit itself continues to be paid normally, and workers who receive maternity pay directly from the INSS, Brazil's national social security institute, are unaffected. The agency cross-checked tax, social security and registration records and found a pattern incompatible with the benefit's rules: companies with a single employee, revenue near zero, missing entries in fiscal ledgers and unusually high claim amounts. The review also found claims tied to insured women with no record of children, business owners listed at the same time as owners and employees of their own companies, and cases in which the same person would have received multiple benefits through different companies within a short period.
Among the examples cited by the Receita Federal is a self-employed courier registered as a microempreendedor individual, a simplified one-person company category, who claimed R$ 500,000 in refunds even though the law does not allow this type of compensation for the category. In another case, companies with little or no relevant revenue filed high-value claims and shared ties with proxies who represented dozens of other companies in similar situations.
The headline figure needs careful reading. The R$ 1 billion refers to blocked claims, not to money actually paid out or stolen. According to the agency, those involved are subject to returning the amounts, paying fines and facing administrative and criminal sanctions, and investigations continue to identify the people responsible. No names have been released.
How the refund works and how to stay safe
Under current rules, a refund is allowed only when a company advances maternity pay to an employee covered by Brazil's general social security regime. Benefits paid directly by the INSS give no right to compensation through the electronic system used for such claims, known as PER/DCOMP. Maternity pay goes to insured mothers and, in cases such as adoption or the death of the mother, can also be granted to insured fathers, according to the INSS.
The agency also warned about people and firms offering tax solutions that promise "guaranteed" credits or fast refunds. Such offers should be treated with caution, the Receita Federal said, because those who join in may have to return the amounts, pay fines and face penalties provided by law. Companies with questions about compensation should check the benefit's rules through official channels before filing any claim.