2022
On March 22, 2022, it was sent to subscribers the first edition of the newsletter de la Agencia Tributaria. In the analysis of that edition we explained to you that the objective of this newsletter weekly was to summarize the main news incorporated into the Electronic Headquarters of the Tax Agency in the previous days and include the corresponding links so that whoever wished could access the complete information.
The growing external projection of the Tax Agency gives increasing importance to the scope of its international relations. The Tax Agency maintains permanent channels of communication, collaboration and mutual assistance with other tax administrations and international organizations, both in Europe and Latin America and in other geographical areas.
Law 11/2021, of July 9, on measures to prevent and combat tax fraud, has introduced an important modification in the field of sanctions derived from the application of the special regime for the group of Value Added Tax entities. ( VAT ), or VAT entity regime.
Article 99.9 of the General Tax Law recently introduced by Royal Decree-Law 22/2020, of June 16, and its materialization for the inspection procedure in article 151.1.e) LGT , regulator of the place of inspection actions, has come to strengthen, with all the coverage and procedural guarantees, a technological development that brings benefits in terms of assistance, provision and streamlining of services and improvement of administration-administered relations.
The mission of the Tax Agency is to promote and ensure compliance with the tax system in an equitable manner, favoring the development of Spanish society, and to achieve this, the Tax Agency considers it essential to encourage voluntary compliance with tax obligations, and it dedicates itself to this much of their efforts and innovations.
In the most recent jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on tax matters we find, with increasing frequency, rulings in whose reasoning the Court appeals to general principles of tax law in addition to the text of the European standard itself.
The Customs Surveillance Service ( SVA ) is an institution traditionally linked to the fight against tobacco smuggling. Thus, its historical origins are found in the bodies that, depending on or under the supervision of the Royal Treasury, had the aforementioned mission with various names, structures and organic assignments: Reservation (maritime and land), Special Land and Maritime Surveillance Service of the Tobacco Lessee Company, Special Land and Maritime Surveillance Service of Tabacalera SA or Special Fiscal Surveillance Service. It was in 1982 when it received its current name after the approval of Royal Decree 319/1982, of February 12, by which the Customs Surveillance Service was restructured and assigned directly to the Ministry of Finance through the General Directorate of Customs and Taxes. Specials.
Tax verification and investigation actions, including judicial assistance actions in which Tax Agency personnel participate, have to be adapted to the situation of the economic sectors to which they are directed. In recent years, economic activities are characterized by their high level of computerization.
The seventh and final indicator provided for in the Tax Agency's Strategic Plan 2020-2023 to measure the evolution of the results of its actions in the medium term is the reduction of interest paid.
The Tax Agency is committed to applying the tax system with generality and fairness to all taxpayers, despite which sometimes its actions generate conflict, that is, they cause taxpayers to file appeals or claims.
The Tax Agency, in its mission to promote and ensure compliance with the tax system, must carry out the necessary actions to guarantee and facilitate the payment of tax debts and, where appropriate, carry out the executive actions that are necessary for the collection of the taxes. debts, tax or not, whose management is entrusted to them.
The strategic objective of the Tax Agency is the improvement of voluntary compliance with tax obligations; To achieve this, it uses a combination of wide-ranging measures such as civic-tax education, information and assistance, prevention of tax and customs fraud, ex post control actions, the promotion of anti-fraud regulatory modifications, agreements with others. organisms, cooperative relationships, etc.
The central axis that guides the actions of the Tax Agency is the improvement of compliance in the voluntary period, increasing the induced effect of the actions of the Tax Agency and decreasing the weight of the quantitative results obtained in the control activities.
The second of the indicators provided for in the Strategic Plan to measure and evaluate the medium-term evolution of voluntary compliance with tax obligations is the measurement of the induced effects.
The strategic objective of the Tax Agency is the improvement of voluntary compliance with tax obligations; To achieve this, it uses a combination of wide-ranging measures ranging from civic-tax education, information and assistance, prevention of tax and customs fraud, a posteriori control actions, the promotion of anti-fraud regulatory modifications, agreements with other organizations, cooperative relationships, etc.
By Law 11/2021, of July 9, known in short as "measures to prevent and combat tax fraud", a new letter j) is added to article 29.2 of the General Tax Law (LGT). establishes the obligation, for producers, marketers and users, that the computer or electronic systems and programs that support the accounting, billing or management processes of those who carry out economic activities, guarantee the integrity, conservation, accessibility, legibility, traceability and unalterability of the records, without interpolations, omissions or alterations of which the due annotation is not left in the systems themselves. Furthermore, in accordance with said regulation, a specific sanctioning regime is established, in article 201 bis of the aforementioned Law, derived from the mere production of these systems or programs, or the possession of them without adequate certification.
The use of cash is necessary in any economy and essential for small transactions. However, the use of cash to pay large amounts is usually not justified. In these cases, reasons of convenience and, of course, security make the use of other payment methods such as transfers, checks, credit or debit cards, etc. more appropriate. In these high-value transactions, cash can be used not for reasons of efficiency, but because it is an opaque means of payment that leaves no trace. The use of cash in such transactions is a well-known mechanism, both domestically and internationally, for money laundering and to avoid the correct taxation of income obtained through direct taxation and VAT accrued in the indirect.
This 2022 marks 30 years since the constitution of the State Tax Administration Agency (Tax Agency). Trying to imagine the path forward in the next 30 years is not only complex, but does not seem appropriate, since the priorities, challenges, opportunities and needs of the Tax Agency depend on very variable factors , such as the economic environment –national and international–, business models or technological advances. However, it is possible to plan for a more reasonable period of time. The Strategic Plan of the Tax Agency 2020-2023 responds to this purpose.
The current Civic-Tax Education Program, created in May 2003, had as its main antecedents the various sociological investigations of the Institute of Fiscal Studies, which allowed continuous knowledge of the social perception of taxation, and the recommendations made in 1994 by the Special Unit for the Study of Fraud on the convenience of introducing tax education in the educational system.
The European Public Prosecutor's Office is an organization with its own legal personality that extends its powers throughout the European Union to protect, in the criminal field, the financial interests of the Union, and which has been created by Regulation (EU) 2017/1939 of the Council, dated October 12, 2017.
In recent years, we have witnessed important advances in the panorama of international exchange of tax information, which has thus become a powerful tool for tax administrations to have access to cross-border information and thus ensure effective application. of the tax system.
The globalization of economies and the increase in cross-border operations has been a great challenge that tax administrations have had to face. The last few years have been key in terms of increasing the transparency of international information and consolidating all information exchanges promoted in the European Union and within the OECD .
The Economic Management Service of the Tax Agency is responsible for the administration of the financial and material resources necessary to fulfill its purposes, additionally acting as the Agency's accounting service.
The Planning and Institutional Relations Service (SEPRI) plays a central role in the design and development of the strategic and operational planning of the Tax Agency, assuming the tasks of promotion, coordination and monitoring of all planning instruments with the ultimate purpose of being the reference service in transversal tasks aimed at fulfilling the organization's mission.
The Spanish tax administration, like all public administrations, requires legal assistance to accompany the development of its actions to guarantee the principle of legality and act with the greatest legal certainty.
As in any organization that has more than 26,000 employees, in the Tax Agency the Human Resources Department constitutes a fundamental piece in its machinery and operation, since all its functions can be condensed into a single one: provide each unit of the organization with the necessary personnel, in quantity and quality, so that they can carry out the functions entrusted to them; as well as having that staff committed, motivated and prepared to carry out their work with the greatest effectiveness at all times.
The Customs and Special Taxes Department of the Tax Agency is entrusted, among other powers, with the management and control of taxes on foreign trade, special taxes and environmental taxes. Another area of competence is related to the repression of smuggling, drug trafficking and money laundering.
The 2020-2023 Strategic Plan constitutes a reflection by the Tax Agency on its commitments, priorities, lines of action and result indicators.
The Tax Agency has been a pioneer in the development of electronic services in the Spanish public sector and in providing citizens with their right to interact by electronic means.
The Collection bodies of the Tax Agency carry out constant work to promote voluntary compliance by taxpayers by improving the mechanisms made available to them.
Last week, the Tax Agency published four statistics: On Tuesday, the foreign trade statistics for February and the monthly advance of the vehicle registration tax corresponding to the month of March were published, and on Wednesday the statistics with the 2019 information from the country-by-country declaration of multinationals with Spanish headquarters and the Weekly daily inside sales report. After the publication of the latter began at the end of the year, it can now be said that there is no week of the year in which the Tax Agency does not publish one or more statistics.
The Tax Agency continues to reinforce, especially within the framework of the 2020-2023 Strategic Plan, the intensification and expansion of its taxpayer assistance services, considering them an essential element to promote voluntary compliance.
The Tax Agency sets as one of its essential objectives to achieve improvement in the tax behavior of taxpayers through compliance assistance. In this assistance work, the Personal Income Tax campaign takes on particular relevance at this time of year.
The Tax Agency establishes among its essential objectives to achieve improvement in the tax behavior of taxpayers through assistance in compliance and, secondly, the fight against tax fraud.
Taxpayer information and assistance constitutes one of the main strategic lines of action of the Tax Agency, intensified in recent years, whose foundation is found in the conviction that its improvement not only facilitates voluntary compliance, but also significantly reduces the failure to comply with tax obligations by everyone.
This is the first edition of the newsletter of the Tax Agency.
We live in a world where staying up to date is a challenge. For this reason, public administrations have to offer citizens the possibility of easily accessing all the information that may interest them. In the tax field, which is so changing, it is even more necessary, hence this new initiative from the Tax Agency.