August 30, 2014
– HA NOI – Online tax payments, first applied in August 2013, have vastly increased efficiency, vice director of HCM City’s State Treasury Nguyen Hoang Hai said on August 26, 2014.
Previously, taxpayers had to go to the State Treasury to submit the required paperwork and the Government agency had to complete four or five procedures. At HCM City’s State Treasury, there were only two transaction sessions each day. Now, thanks to collaboration between the Treasury and commercial banks, people can pay their taxes via the Internet as well as ATMs or Vietinbank, BIDV, Agribank and Vietcombank branches.
In addition to halving the amount of paperwork, this also helped avoid overlap when inputting taxpayer information to the State Treasury and bank systems, Hai said.
Since last August, Vietinbank’s system was used for about three million tax payments worth trillions of Vietnamese dong, according to Director General Le Duc Tho.
While the online system increased efficiency, it was still difficult to deal with foreign currency and unstable Internet transmission lines during peak times such as the end of the working day or month, said director general of the State Treasury Nguyen Hong Ha.
New circular
Enterprises will no longer have to declare and calculate value added tax (VAT) if importers return their goods or the goods are circulated within sectors of the enterprises after a new Finance Ministry circular takes effect next month.
The circular also regulates that enterprises will not have to fill out invoices and declare VAT if they export machines, equipment, materials and goods for borrowing or returning.
The move, which aims to help enterprises save over 200 hours on tax procedures, is part of the ministry’s response to an order by the Prime Minister to cut the time enterprises take to complete tax paperwork below 300 hours a year by the end of 2014.
The average Vietnamese business spends 537 hours each year dealing with tax procedures, while the average time in other ASEAN member countries is only 171, according to the World Bank. The Prime Minister urged the tax sector to reduce the duration of tax procedures to that regional level in 2015.
(VNS)