Employees just need to 'Consent'... Year-end Tax Settlement Becomes More Convenient

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyunjung] From now on, the year-end tax settlement system will be greatly simplified so that the procedure is completed simply by the worker 'consenting' to provide related data. Small business owners who have suffered sales damage due to COVID-19 and receive the government's Support Fund Plus will be granted a tax audit deferral.

On the 13th, Kim Daeji, Commissioner of the National Tax Service, held a nationwide tax office chiefs meeting at the Sejong Government Complex and finalized and announced the '2021 Second Half National Tax Administration Operation Plan' containing these details. Commissioner Kim said, "In the second half of the year, we must fully promote the transition to digital tax administration," and explained, "The year-end tax settlement process will be greatly reorganized so that it can be completed only with the worker's consent to provide simplified data."

◆For year-end tax settlement, workers only need to 'consent' = Until now, workers had to directly download simplified data via the internet and submit it to their company for year-end tax settlement, and elderly or foreign workers who had difficulty using the internet or dependent family members had to visit the tax office to print documents, causing inconvenience.

However, starting this year, a bulk simplified data provision service will be introduced, allowing most procedures to be handled by the National Tax Service and the company once the worker gives prior consent to provide data through the company. First, the National Tax Service will provide the worker's simplified data in bulk to the affiliated company, and the company will prepare the year-end tax settlement documents based on this. The worker then only needs to 'confirm' the final results.

Along with this, as part of strengthening digital taxpayer services, the YouTube sign language consultation video service, previously provided for taxpayers who have difficulty with voice consultations, will be expanded to cover various tax categories, and a service providing national tax certificates in electronic Braille will be introduced. Electronic Braille will first be provided for national tax certificates and year-end tax settlement data, with plans to expand to notices and other areas in the future.

A special comprehensive real estate tax application service that pre-fills the jointly owned housing shares for couples will also be introduced. A simplified comprehensive real estate tax calculation function that allows comparison of tax amounts depending on the application of the special case will be separately provided. Additionally, an integrated inheritance property inquiry system consolidating the decedent's property information will be developed, and a service that automatically informs similar property sales cases when electronically reporting the gift of multi-unit housing will be offered.

◆Tax audit deferral for those receiving Support Fund Plus = The National Tax Service will also ease tax verification for small business owners affected by COVID-19. In addition to the existing reduction in tax audits, all businesses receiving Support Fund Plus due to reasons such as gathering bans or management crises will be newly added to the audit deferral target.

Previously, the National Tax Service had reduced the annual number of tax audits to about 14,000 cases to support COVID-19 damage relief and implemented various tax verification easing measures such as excluding self-employed and small business owners from tax verification.

Furthermore, to provide effective livelihood support, the incentive payments for the 2020 regular and semi-annual tax settlements will be paid by the end of this month, ahead of the legal deadline (September 30).

In addition, in the second half of the year, strict measures will be taken against tax evasion related to real estate transactions, tax evasion harming livelihoods, and unfair wealth succession, and investigation capabilities will be strengthened. To this end, a system for continuous monitoring and type-specific analysis and management of evasion acts will be established, and investigation infrastructure will be advanced through enhanced inter-agency cooperation.

Commissioner Kim said, "We will maximize support for economic recovery through broader tax verification easing and multifaceted tax administration support," and added, "The real-time income tracking system for nationwide employment insurance will also be implemented without delay." He urged attendees, "We must do our best in our core duties such as strict response to unfair tax evasion and securing tax revenue budgets."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.