"The social agreement says the state will not impose any new financial burdens on business this year and next," Branko Meh, the boss of the Chamber of Trade Crafts and Small Business (OZS), told the press on Wednesday.

The government plans a rollout of certified cash registers in October. The move, billed as a cornerstone of the crackdown on the grey economy, will affect all cash-based businesses, mostly small proprietors.

While the government says the solution will be cheap for business owners, who will need no special hardware, just an internet connection, the OZS believes the cost could be as much as EUR 1,500 per business.

"The state should buy the registers and maintain them," Meh said, adding that the cost entailed digital certificates, software, hardware and internet connection. "The state should finance all of this and lease the equipment to businesses free of charge," he said.

The OZS has been gone from outright rejection of the government plans to tentative acceptance. Its members are mostly small businesses, many of them cash-based.

A milder system of virtual certified registers, which merely prevents the deletion of receipts, has been in place since mid-2013.

The move is estimated to have resulted in additional tax receipts of EUR 100m in the first year, mostly from establishments such as bars and hairdressers.