Less than four months remain before the mandatory introduction of the electronic system for tracing the circulation of alcoholic beverages and tobacco products (eExcise), but full-scale industrial testing of the platform has not yet begun, which creates a risk of stopping the excise industry from November 1, head of the parliamentary committee on finance, tax and customs policy Danylo Hetmantsev has stated.
"Business is interested in the launch… I know that retail alone spent UAH 200 million on software. I am convinced that tobacco and vodka spent even more. This is huge money spent on the implementation of this software, which does not work through the fault of the Ministry of Digital Transformation," the head of the Rada committee said at the forum "Recovery of Ukraine: European Integration and Institutional Reforms" in Kyiv on Monday.
According to Hetmantsev, due to the unreadiness of the IT platform, the entire excise industry and retail find themselves under threat of shutdown from November 1. He reminded that at the end of 2025, the Verkhovna Rada already postponed the deadlines for implementing the system by 10 months at the written request of the Ministry of Digital Transformation, which defined this period as sufficient for development.
Hetmantsev added that further decisions regarding the reform will be made exclusively after "political decisions on the resignations of unprofessional people, the leadership of the Ministry of Digital Transformation, who brought both business and the eExcise administration system to such a state."
As reported, earlier leading business associations, including the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine (ACC), the International Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine (ICC Ukraine), the Federation of Employers of Ukraine (FEU), the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs (SUP), Ukrvodka, and the Ukrainian Food Retail Alliance (UFRA), appealed to the relevant committee warning about the risks of launching eExcise from November 1, 2026 due to delays in handing over software for testing. According to Hetmantsev’s estimates, the launch of the system should bring about UAH 50 billion to the budget from the de-shadowing of the market.
