A grocer in Ninh Binh province fills tax forms online. (Photo: VNA) Minh estimated nine-month tax revenues at over 1.1 quadrillion VND (46.13billion USD), up roughly 22 % compared to the same period last year.
The deputy director believed the rise in tax revenues could beattributed to the digital transformation in tax administration.
The launch of e-invoices, an e-Tax mobile application forindividual taxpayers, and an e-Tax portal for foreign service providers havemade tax payments possible everywhere.
Specifically, e-invoices increased value added tax(VAT) collection in September by 13.8% against the same month lastyear, even though VAT rates have been cut by 2% on certain goods and services.
Thirty-six foreign service providers registered for the e-Taxportal after six months of its operation, paying over 1.2 trillion VND of taxto the State Budget.
"Six giants - Google, Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, TikTok,Netflix, and Apple - which collectively account for 90% of e-commercerevenues in Vietnam, has registered, declared, and paid their tax via theportal," he said.
Economic recovery is another factor contributing to the increasedtax revenues. Remarkably, land use tax revenues surpassed annualtargets by 50%, personal income tax revenues by 33% and excise tax revenues by25%.
However, the deputy director also admitted that monthlycensus told a different story.
Tax revenues topped 133 trillion VND in July but fell to around 106trillion VND in August and plunged to approximately 79 trillion VND inSeptember.
He said the global uncertainties caused by the Russia-Ukraineconflict and the economic instability felt by many countries have causeda major impact on Vietnam's economy, dragging down tax revenues inrecent months.
He was concerned that the situation would remain tough towardsyear-end and the annual growth target of 15.5% for 2022 seems not an easytask.
In his estimation, the target requires tax revenues of over 85trillion VND per month in the next three months, nearly 5.5 trillion VND higherthan September.
He called for three measures to be taken to this end.
First, tax authorities need to improve e-commerce taxcollection in line with the governmental Official Dispatch 889, whichstipulates that the authorities collect tax data from e-commerce platforms viadigital means, establish an e-commerce tax database, and embrace data-sharingsolutions.
Second, tax authorities need to develop e-invoice big data andemploy data-analysis tools to facilitate tax administration. They also need tolaunch the "lucky invoice" programmes in 63 provinces andcities in October and introduce e-invoice generated by cash registers.
Third, tax authorities need to draw up new legal documents toensure the sector be well-regulated. The general department of taxationcompleted three decrees, one decision and one circular in the first nine monthsof the year. One new decree and five new circulars are under development todate.
The deputy director said tax authorities have madedigitalised tax declaration, tax payment and tax refund available to over 99%of firms so far.
The general department of taxation has considerably improvedadministrative procedures by reducing the number of administrative processesfrom 304 to 234. All tier-3 and tier-4 processes have been moved to thenational public service portal for the ease of taxpayers./.
VNA
