Business people on Facebook are spreading the word about tax evasion. Accordingly, when paying for purchases and sales by bank transfer, absolutely do not write the following content: purchase, payment for goods, payment of bills, deposit for goods, transfer of goods, debt payment... Just write the customer name or customer code.

Customers who include the recommended information will be charged an additional 10% tax.

The reason for this is the information shared by online business people: “From January 1, 2025, tax authorities will have the right to access all personal accounts to collect e-commerce tax. Transactions with the content “buy”, “sell”… will be taxed at a rate of 10% of the transferred amount to be paid to the state budget”.

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Every activity on social networks leaves traces. Photo: Kieu Oanh

On the evening of January 10, in a separate response to VietNamNet Newspaper about the solution to control tax losses with the above "trick", the media representative of the General Department of Taxation affirmed: "All business activities on social networks leave traces and tax authorities have solutions to monitor and handle violations because now tax management is based on electronic data. Tax authorities have scanning tools, if the Facebook of an individual/organization intentionally "evades" taxes, when discovered, they will be handled in accordance with the provisions of the law".

Most recently, in November 2024, there was a case of criminal prosecution of an individual for tax evasion in e-commerce business in Hanoi.

According to VietNamNet 's research, recently, tax authorities are actively coordinating with e-commerce trading floors and relevant state management agencies to clean up the large database of taxpayers doing e-commerce business.

The General Department of Taxation is promoting the application of AI (artificial intelligence) to process big data and issue warnings in cases of tax risks.

Along with that, the tax sector will coordinate with commercial banks to collect information including: data on cash flow transactions through accounts of domestic organizations and individuals with foreign online service providers (such as: Google, Facebook, Youtube, Netflix, ...); personal information, content and transaction amount of personal accounts showing signs of e-commerce business activities.

At the same time, coordinate with ministries and branches to share and connect data to serve tax management for e-commerce activities. In particular, the Ministry of Public Security reviews and unifies the national database on population with the tax code database. The Ministry of Industry and Trade connects data on e-commerce trading floors. The Ministry of Information and Communications shares data on organizations and individuals operating in the fields of telecommunications, advertising, radio and television. The State Bank provides information on payment accounts and cash flow.

Tax authorities do not access personal accounts to collect e-commerce taxes.

In the information sent to the press on the evening of January 10, the General Department of Taxation affirmed: The information that "tax authorities have the right to access all personal accounts from January 1, 2025 to collect taxes on e-commerce" is incorrect. According to tax law, tax authorities do not do this.

According to the provisions of the Law on Tax Administration and Decree 126/2020/ND-CP, tax authorities have the right to request relevant agencies and organizations including e-commerce trading floors, commercial banks, shipping units, etc. to provide relevant information for the purpose of inspection, examination, determination of tax obligations of taxpayers and implementation of measures to enforce administrative decisions on tax management according to the provisions of tax law.

Based on information collected from many sources, the tax authority shall review and compare the information declared by the taxpayer to identify taxpayers who do not declare and pay taxes or do not fully declare the amount of tax payable and shall collect and impose penalties according to regulations. In case the taxpayer is found to have committed tax evasion, the tax authority shall transfer the case to the police for handling according to the provisions of law.

According to current tax management laws, if a business individual has revenue of over 100 million VND/year, he/she is subject to value added tax (VAT) and personal income tax (PIT).

Accordingly, individuals selling goods online pay personal income tax at a rate of 0.5%, VAT at a rate of 1%; individuals with income from advertising on products, digital information content services, other services pay personal income tax at a rate of 2%, VAT at a rate of 5%...

From December 19, 2024, the tax sector has officially operated the "Electronic information portal for households and individuals doing business to register, declare, and pay taxes from e-commerce and business on digital platforms".

According to Law No. 56/2024/QH15, from April 1, 2025, managers of e-commerce trading floors and digital platforms (including domestic and foreign organizations) are responsible for deducting, paying taxes on behalf of, and declaring deducted taxes on behalf of households and individuals doing e-commerce business.

With this regulation, an e-commerce trading floor can deduct, pay taxes, and declare deducted taxes on behalf of hundreds of thousands of individuals.