What if tax returns were like a credit card bill? In your credit card bill, you don’t have to fill-in how much you have to pay, the credit card agency does it for you. Your only job is to pay the bill and, if there are wrong entries in it, to inform the credit card agency to have that error corrected. This same easy process can be done for tax returns via the use of “pre-populated tax returns.”
“This intervention will influence taxpayers to make better decisions without taking away their ability to choose since they can amend or change their return before filing it,” said ACG Founding Chairman and Senior Tax Advisor Mon Abrea.
How it works is that the government would gather data from third party reports and data already in the possession of the government, which would then be downloadable into the correct electronic tax forms. The taxpayer could then review the forms, add any other data needed, and then file the forms.
“The primary benefit is that it significantly reduces the compliance burden for taxpayers and there would be greater certainty that the taxpayers have fully reported their income,” added Abrea.
However, this proposal is not without criticisms. Could something like this actually work in the Philippines? Learn more by reading the full article here: https://tinyurl.com/ACGPre-populatedTax-Returns
