Cumbersome, complicated, and confusing administrative procedures cause personal income tax settlement to be stuck, and many people are frustrated because it takes too much time and effort.
7 times online payment still not completed
Mr. Xuan Cuong (Hoang Mai District, Hanoi) said that he had two irregular incomes that had to be taxed. After being instructed by the agency's accounting department, he collected invoices and documents for these two items from the paying unit. Mr. Cuong submitted his application online via the eTax service and thought that it would save time and be able to quickly settle his taxes.
However, Mr. Cuong submitted the application 7 times but was still unsuccessful. " The irony is that when I sent the application, the system still reported that it was successfully sent. But after 24 hours, the application was returned without any reason, making me not know how to edit and complete my application correctly. I am very upset because each time I register for a tax application, it takes a lot of time and goes through many stages. Going to settle taxes to exercise rights and obligations according to the law but it is difficult like this is really too inappropriate, causing frustration for people," said Mr. Cuong.
According to Mr. Cuong, he also went directly to the Hoang Mai District Tax Department to ask about his case. But after listening to the tax officer's explanation, he still did not know what step he had gone wrong because the procedure was too confusing.
"Not having enough strength to pursue the case, I had to accept paying the fine for overdue tax payment and give up the 10 million VND tax refund that the local authority had previously paid me," Mr. Cuong shared dejectedly.
Mr. Pham Hong Le (Hoang Mai District, Hanoi) has a casual income of 1.2 million VND. After being instructed by the accounting department of the local company, Mr. Le checked and found out that this amount was displayed on eTax and had not been paid tax by the paying unit. Therefore, he had to finalize his tax to get a personal income tax refund due to family deductions worth 12 million VND.
Mr. Le said that the tax authority requires invoices and documents for the temporary collection. Therefore, he went to the unit that paid the temporary collection to get an invoice. However, even though the accounting department confirmed that the documents were valid, Mr. Le still could not complete the online application submission.
"I submitted 5 times and every few days I received a notice from the tax department that the application was unsuccessful because the taxpayer's bank account did not exist in the tax registration. However, I asked the company's accountant to check carefully and it was clear that my account was still operating normally, all my income was received/spent from that account," Mr. Le wondered.
According to Mr. Le, just because the 1.2 million VND irregular income could not be settled, he now has to pay back 12 million VND in tax refund due to family deduction, pay personal income tax worth 120,000 VND (10% of the irregular income) and pay a fine of more than 200,000 VND for late tax payment.
" For every 1 dong earned, 10 dong were lost, and this brought more frustration to me. In my opinion, in this case, it was due to the complexity of tax procedures, not the people's fault, because I was very conscious of paying taxes, and tried every way to pay but failed," he complained.
Businesses also "distorted face"
Ms. Tran Thu Trang, an accountant at an administrative unit, said that tax settlement for individuals currently has overlapping regulations.
“My agency has an employee who has income from another place, unit A, for 5 months, of which 4 months the income is 10 million VND, the paying unit has collected 10% tax of these 4 months, which is 4 million VND. But in the remaining month, the employee only has an income of 1 million VND, according to regulations, he is not subject to tax, so unit A does not collect tax.
When my agency made tax settlement for this individual, because Party A did not collect enough 10% of the total 41 million VND, the employee was not authorized to let us settle the tax, but the employee had to do it himself," she said.
Or a person has a regular monthly income of 1.9 million VND, according to regulations, this income is not subject to tax. But at the end of the year, when going to settle taxes, the tax authority will collect 10% of the whole year, that is 10% of 22.8 million VND. Obviously, this source of income is not subject to tax but in the end, more than 2.2 million VND in taxes must be paid.
"The regulations are contradictory. But if they don't settle, workers will have to pay a fine for the declaration and late payment, which costs a lot of money," said Ms. Trang.
Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Tu, senior tax expert and lecturer at the University of Business and Technology, also commented that tax payment procedures are now too complicated.
“Even though I have worked in the tax office for decades, now it is difficult to go through the procedures for paying personal income tax, not to mention people who do not know anything. I have never seen the tax industry with so many complicated procedures for tax settlement, tax collection, and tax refunds for people as it is now,” Mr. Tu affirmed.
According to Mr. Tu, the number of people paying personal income tax is currently increasing continuously and reaching more than 10 million people, leading to difficulties in the management of tax agencies. In addition, many people currently work in other agencies, such as teachers in many schools, accountants working in many businesses, which makes tax payment and tax settlement increasingly complicated.
However, the main reason why people have difficulty in settling taxes is because employees are not given detailed and detailed instructions by tax authorities. Most people have little access to having to settle personal income tax themselves, so they cannot thoroughly understand the technical issues to do it accurately and quickly.
Mr. Tu said that this is also the responsibility of the Ministry of Finance, the General Department of Taxation, and tax agencies. These units must clearly and distinctly guide the policy mechanism to the people, helping them understand the nature of the problem and the procedures.
In addition, it is possible to consider the tax industry automatically refunding taxes to people electronically, instead of forcing people to declare and submit complicated documents to get a tax refund.
"Electronic invoices and identification codes have been provided to the tax authorities, so the tax sector can easily control and refund taxes to people, while the tax authorities must proactively handle the procedures.
When asking people to pay taxes, why is it so fast? When refunding taxes to people, why are there so many complicated procedures? All tax data is available, from income, salary, extra income, deductions, provisional payments... Tax refunds for people with income need to be automated to cut down on administrative procedures and support people.
"Don't let it be easy to collect taxes but difficult to refund them. If the tax authority does not provide specific instructions, causing people to continuously make false declarations, they will get frustrated and give up on their tax refunds, then the tax authority will easily be accused of overcharging," Mr. Tu stated his opinion.
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