13 departments join hands to promote tax payment facilitation

Thirteen departments, including the State Taxation Administration (STA), National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), Ministry of Finance (MOF), and Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (MOHRSS), jointly issued a guideline to promote tax payment facilitation and improve the tax environment for businesses. By the end of 2021, China will build a national electronic invoice service platform for market entities to further bring down government-imposed transaction costs, according to the guideline.

Han Guorong, director of the Taxpayer Service Department of STA, said that the guideline aims to promote the reform of tax payment facilitation through the joint efforts of multiple departments in the following five aspects:

Continue to improve theimplementation of tax-cut and fee-reduction policies

The guideline requests that taxation and human resources and social security authorities further strengthen cooperation and expand online and offline channels to make sure that tax and fee payers fully understand the relevant policies. It also requests that taxation, finance, and treasury departments work closely together, smoothing the VAT refund channels to ensure that eligible taxpayers receive tax refunds promptly.

Improve the convenience of tax payment

The guideline clarifies that departments of taxation, human resources and social security, and housing and urban-rural development should continue to optimize the tax payment process. Additionally, the tax payment time should be shortened to less than 120 hours by the end of 2020 and 100 hours by the end of 2022. The guideline also requests those departments to improve "non-contact" tax payment services, allowing the most commonly used taxation services to be completed online by the end of 2020.

Advance electronic invoice reform to increase efficiency and reduce the burden of taxation

According to the guideline, taxation, development and reform, public security and finance departments should work together to steadily advance electronic invoice reform, providing electronic VAT invoices for new taxpayers by the end of 2020.

Optimize tax law enforcement methods to protect the rights and interests of market entities

The guideline emphasizes that the government should collect taxes and fees in compliance with laws and regulations. The government should also continuously improve the taxation big data system and risk management mechanisms to build a new dynamic "credit plus risk" management method.

Strengthen the performance tracing and evaluation of tax policy implementation

The guideline aims to improve tax and fee payers' experience and asks governmental authorities to provide an evaluation system that contains government service items, evaluation objects, and service channels.