P.R. Laws tit. 13, § 32141
(a) Any person who wishes to do business in Puerto Rico as a merchant must file with the Secretary an Application for Merchant’s Registration Certificate for each commercial establishment, stating the names of the persons with an interest in said business and their residences, the address of the main office of the business, and any location where sales are carried out, as well as any other information that the Secretary may require.
(b) The application described in subsection (a) of this section must be submitted to the Secretary before the person, business, partnership, or corporation begins to operate a business, as well as those that were operating at the time of the approval of this act.
(c) No merchant may sell, assign, transfer, or otherwise convey to another any Certificate of Registration for Merchants according to the provisions of this part unless such transfer is duly authorized by the Secretary after meeting the requirements established in this part and the rules or regulations adopted for the administration and implementation thereof.
(d) The Secretary, after approving the application for the certificate of registration for merchants, shall grant the applicant a merchant’s registry certificate in which the requirement of the merchant as a withholding agent is established.
(e) Every merchant shall be required to notify the Secretary about any change or amendment to the information required in the application for the registry of merchants, the theft of the merchant’s registry certificate, or the total or partial cease of operations, not later than thirty (30) days after the change or the event.
(f) The Secretary of the Treasury shall be empowered to prescribe by regulations or official communication, any requirement deemed necessary for the Puerto Rico Registry of Merchants administered by the Department of the Treasury, as well as for establishing the necessary coordination to carry out the allowed data transfer to the Puerto Rico Trade and Export Company and for the purposes set forth in subsection (g) of this section.
(g) The Department of the Treasury shall share and transfer, free of charge, and through the electronic means available, certain data from the Registry for Merchants to the Trade and Export Company of the Government of Puerto Rico. The form and manner in which said statistical data shall be shared shall be prescribed by Regulations or Circular Letter issued by the Department of the Treasury in conjunction with the Trade and Export Company, without impairing the rights of the taxpayers that are registered in the Registry for Merchants administered by the Department of the Treasury. The Regulations to be adopted under this part or any other future law regarding the Registry for Merchants for purposes of sharing and transferring the statistical data that by mutual agreement and in coordination is transferred from the Department of the Treasury to the Trade and Export Company shall include all those safeguards that provide for the protection of the rights set forth in the Bill of Rights of Taxpayers and in all those laws and regulations in effect that govern the confidentiality of the taxpayer’s information. The data to be shared between the aforementioned departments shall be treated as strictly confidential, and both agencies shall determine the general information that does not statistically identify a particular taxpayer, but rather a general business or entrepreneurial sector of our economy. The information gathered and to be shared shall be exclusively used for the creation of a statistical data and marketing source for the planning of the economic and entrepreneurial development of Puerto Rico that allows for the formulation of a public policy based on real and reliable data, that is consistent with the actual realities of the commercial or entrepreneurial sectors of the Island.
History —Jan. 31, 2011, No. 1, § 4060.01, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2011; June 29, 2012, No. 128, § 1; June 30, 2013, No. 40, § 50.