In May 2013, “il Sole 24 Ore”, the official house-organ of the Italian Confindustria, daily bible of Italian merchantmen and professional consultants, made a survey to find out how the compulsory certified e-mail system worked. It should be noted that the Certified Mail (in Italian “PEC – Posta Elettronica Certificata”) is compulsory in Italy for some entities: as of L. 221/2012 that converted Decree 179/2012 for all companies and professionals, and as of Legislative Decree 82/2005 for public bodies and administrations. This excellent contribution, by Antonio Iorio, can be read here.

It turned out (not?) surprisingly that while the Tax offices have no problem whatsoever in serving their communications via PEC (including notification of decisions, scheduling of hearings and so on), they mainly do not accept to be notified with the same medium. The situation, by the way, has not changed since May (thus I can easily quote it here today).

In other words, the taxpayer receives tax notifications from a distant future, but he’s only allowed to respond with a nineteenth century instrument. Like being attacked by Mars and fighting back with a 1886 Winchester rifle… It does look like a Steampunk nightmare!