Article 1 Annual clearance of accounts

The Commission shall assess the eligibility of each project reported in the request for the payment of the annual balance referred to in Article 1 of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2015/377^f1 in relation to the objectives of the Specific Regulations defined in Regulation (EU) No 514/2014 and those of the national programme approved in accordance with Article 14 of Regulation (EU) No 514/2014.

When deciding on the payment of the annual balance, the Commission shall also take into consideration the information provided in:

The Commission shall clear all amounts declared in the accounts where there is no doubt on the completeness, accuracy and veracity in the accounts submitted

The Commission may require further information because of incomplete or unclear information provided, disagreements, differences of interpretation or any other inconsistency relating to a request for payment.

The Member State concerned shall, upon request by the Commission, provide additional information by the deadline set in that request. In justified cases, on request by the Member State before the expiry of the deadline, the Commission may accept a request for late submission of information and set a new deadline.

Where the Member State concerned fails to provide the additional information by the deadline or if the response is unsatisfactory the Commission may proceed with the clearance decision on the basis of the information in its possession.

The Commission shall inform the Member State of its decision on the payment of the annual balance, including the reasons for any accounts or amounts in the accounts not paid.

Where accounts or amounts in the accounts are not paid by the Commission, the Member State may submit additional information for the accounts or amounts to be reconsidered in subsequent financial years.

Where the amount accepted by the Commission in the decision on the clearance of annual accounts for financial year N is lower than the annual pre-financing amount for financial year N, the latter amount shall be cleared against the former. Any outstanding pre-financing amount shall be cleared in the course of subsequent clearance exercises.

The first subparagraph shall apply also in cases where a Member State submits annual accounts reporting zero payment.

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Paragraphs 1 to 5 of this Article shall apply, mutatis mutandis, to amounts recovered.