After registration: the calendar that costs more than the fees

Q: I generated no turnover: do I still have to pay?

The minimum levy, yes: 30,000 DZD under the flat tax, 10,000 DZD under auto-entrepreneur status, paid in full with the forecast filing. Filings remain due too — including taxes whose amount is nil. What silence saves in paper it charges back as office assessment.

Q: What does a late-filed declaration cost me exactly?

Two durations decide. Filing: a 10 % surcharge up to one month late, 20 % up to two months, 25 % beyond — or fixed fines of 2,500 to 10,000 DZD if the late definitive filing carries no payment. Payment: a 10 % penalty from day one past the deadline, then a 3 % monthly surcharge capped at 25 %. Two distinct clocks running in parallel.

Q: I hire my first employee: what do I declare, and when?

You declare the employee to social security from occupation, pay contributions within thirty days following each quarter with ten employees or fewer — monthly beyond — and file the annual salary statement within thirty days after the end of the civil year. As an employer under the flat tax, you also remit income tax withheld on salaries on the quarterly schedule.

Q: Are sanctions only financial?

No. Beyond surcharges and fines, the administration may proceed to assessment by office with surcharge — notably for undeclared training taxes — and certain management failures expose the manager to their own liability. Calendar compliance is personal protection too, not just budgeting.

Q: Where can I find the complete official calendar of my obligations?

The General Directorate of Taxes publishes and updates a professional fiscal calendar, and the social-security funds publish their own deadlines. Our practical advice stays the same: once your regime is set, have a consolidated calendar built — tax, social, governance — dated from your real start of activity, since several delays run from that date rather than January 1st.

BENSAID Farouk — Financial Expert 22 August 2026 7 min read Updated: August 2026

In short: The incorporation budget ends at the notary; the compliance budget starts the day after registration — and it does not depend on turnover. Three families of hidden costs structure year one. Missed deadlines: existence declaration within thirty days under a 30,000 DZD penalty, forecast filing by June 30, definitive by January 20, with escalations climbing from 10 % to 25 %. Minimums owed without activity: 30,000 DZD of flat tax, 10,000 DZD for the auto-entrepreneur — taxation does not wait for first sales. And silent obligations: initialled registers, taxes declared « even where no amount is due », general meeting within six months of closing, documents kept ten years. Every figure in this article comes from the tax administration's own documentation or the underlying statute — because a priced delay gets provisioned, while a discovered one gets endured.

Keywords in this article

taxation does not start with turnover existence: 30 days · 30,000 DZD fine minimum levy due even at zero escalations 10 / 20 / 25 % 3 % per month late-payment surcharge the mandatory « nil » filing documents kept ten years general meeting within six months of closing

1. 1. Why do the real costs start the day after registration?

The founder budgets the notary, registration and the register. Then he discovers the company has inherited three clocks that tick independently of turnover.

Clock	What it runs
Tax	Existence, forecast and definitive filings — each dated, each sanctioned
Social	Affiliation and declarations at the funds from the first employee — and for a non-salaried manager, the annual contribution
Governance	Meeting within six months of closing, registers kept, documents archived ten years

None of these three lines appears on an incorporation quote. All appear at the first audit. This article walks them in the order they fall — official amounts included.

2. 2. The tax clock: which deadlines, on which dates?

For a company under the flat tax or auto-entrepreneur status, year one reads as follows (official documentation of the General Directorate of Taxes):

Deadline	Time limit	Cost of missing it
Existence declaration « G n°8 »	30 days from starting activity	30,000 DZD fine (art. 194 CIDTA)
Forecast declaration « G n°12 » + payment	By June 30 (full payment, or 50 % then 25 %+25 %)	Late filing loses instalment rights; escalations below
Definitive declaration « G n°12 bis »	By January 20 N+1, actual turnover stated	Escalations then fixed fines by duration
Minimum levy	Paid in full with the forecast filing	30,000 DZD — 10,000 DZD auto-entrepreneur, even without activity (art. 365)
Registers (purchases/sales or journal)	Initialled and countersigned, produced on demand	10,000 DZD flat fine
Training & apprenticeship taxes	20th of the month after each half-year	Filing due even where no amount is due — otherwise assessed by office with a 25 % surcharge

Two lines surprise everyone. First: the minimum levy is owed even without turnover — a company registered in December will pay its minimum by the following June. Second: training taxes are learned about through a nil filing, not through silence.

3. 3. What does lateness cost exactly? The official scale

The amounts are fixed and progressive — better known before they apply:

Delay	Sanction
Late filing, ≤ 1 month	10 % surcharge
One to two months	20 %
Beyond two months	25 %
Late definitive filing without payment	Fixed fines of 2,500 / 5,000 / 10,000 DZD by duration
Late IFU payment	10 % penalty from day one, then a monthly surcharge of 3 %, capped at 25 %

The monthly surcharge is the most dangerous mechanism: it turns a one-off oversight into a debt that grows alone. Conversely, these scales are perfectly predictable — which means provisionable.

The golden rule from this table. A late filing accompanied by payment costs less than a perfect filing paid after the deadline: the payment penalty runs from day one regardless of the quality of what is declared.

Your first year, provisioned in advance

A personalised calendar of every fiscal and social deadline, provisions priced on your actual regime and structured reminders: we install compliance before the first delay.

Install my calendar

On the funds' side, two regimes, two calendars.

The employer who hires must declare to social security every person employed, whatever the nature or duration of remuneration, and pay contributions within thirty days following each quarter's due date with ten employees or fewer — monthly beyond. The annual salary statement (DAS) follows within thirty days after the end of each civil year.
The non-salaried manager falls under the non-salaried regime: mandatory affiliation from the start of activity, declared base, then an annual contribution on a fixed date. The amount depends on regime and declared situation — we do not publish those rates here: they are verified with the fund, file in hand.

And since May 2026, civil servants of the corps authorised by decree No. 26-202 to exercise a private activity see their employing organism itself declare to the tax services and social-security bodies (article 19) — a novelty worth knowing for anyone advising this public.

5. 5. Governance has its price too: meetings, registers, archives

Every trading company keeps full accounts and approves them at an ordinary general meeting within six months of closing (article 584). It is not internal courtesy: it is the deadline that produces the minutes, the allocation of results and the legal starting point for dividends.

Accounting documents and supporting pieces are kept ten years, books included — far longer than founders imagine.
In a joint-stock company governance hardens further: preparatory documents sent before the meeting, auditors' reports, a legal reserve deducted before any distribution.

None of this is costly in itself. Forgetting is what bills you: late meeting, reconstructed minutes, missing archive at audit — every lapse settles in lost time or penalty.

6. 6. How to budget all this from day one?

Draw your personal calendar at registration

Start-of-activity date +30 days, then June 30, January 20, six months from closing: four dates written down before the first invoice goes out.

Provision minimums like rent

The minimum levy and the annual social contribution are owed whatever happens: they enter operating budget, not « contingencies ».

Always file, even nil

Taxes with no amount due still require their filing; silence is the only option assessed by office. A nil filing costs a stamp; forgetting costs an assessed levy with surcharge.

Pay before perfecting

Facing a missed deadline, payment precedes documentary cleanup: the payment penalty runs from day one, the monthly surcharge afterwards.

This page prices obligations on the basis of cited texts. It replaces no personal calendar: some deadlines vary by regime, start date and nature of activity, and call for verification file in hand.

FAQ — Frequently asked questions

I generated no turnover: do I still have to pay?

What does a late-filed declaration cost me exactly?

I hire my first employee: what do I declare, and when?

Are sanctions only financial?

Where can I find the complete official calendar of my obligations?

Sources and references

Direction générale des impôts — Le régime de l'Impôt Forfaitaire Unique (IFU), page mise à jour le 28 février 2026 : déclaration d'existence G n°8 sous 30 jours (amende 30 000 DA, art. 194 CIDTA), déclaration prévisionnelle G n°12 au 30 juin avec paiement total ou fractionné 50/25/25, déclaration définitive G n°12 bis au 20 janvier N+1, majorations de dépôt tardif 10 / 20 / 25 % (art. 282 nonies), amendes fixes 2 500 / 5 000 / 10 000 DA, pénalité de paiement tardif 10 % et astreinte mensuelle de 3 % plafonnée à 25 % (art. 402-1), minimums de perception 30 000 DA et 10 000 DA auto-entrepreneur (art. 365, art. 29 LF 2025), registres cotés et paraphés (amende 10 000 DA, art. 282 duodecies), conservation des pièces dix ans (art. 64 CPF, art. 99 LF 2025), taxes de formation professionnelle et d'apprentissage : déclaration due même à néant, imposition d'office majorée de 25 % (art. 196 sexies-septies) — Direction générale des impôts (DGI) · Verified on 22/08/2026
CNAS — Obligations de l'employeur : déclaration de tout salarié quelle que soit la rémunération ; versement des cotisations dans les trente jours suivant l'échéance trimestrielle (dix salariés au plus) ou mensuelle (plus de dix) ; déclaration annuelle des salaires (DAS) dans les trente jours suivant la fin de l'année civile — Caisse nationale des assurances sociales des travailleurs salariés · Verified on 22/08/2026
Ordonnance n° 75-59 du 26 septembre 1975 portant code de commerce, modifiée et complétée — art. 584 : approbation des comptes par l'assemblée générale ordinaire dans les six mois de la clôture de l'exercice — Ministère du Commerce · Verified on 06/08/2026
Décret exécutif n° 26-202 du 16 mai 2026 — art. 19 : l'exercice d'une activité lucrative à titre privé par les fonctionnaires autorisés est soumis à une déclaration par l'organisme employeur auprès des services des impôts et des organismes de sécurité sociale — Journal officiel de la République algérienne n° 38 du 25 mai 2026 · Verified on 22/08/2026