Since its creation, the Tax Agency has established the prevention and fight against tax fraud as fundamental and permanent strategic objectives.

The 2020-2023 Strategic Plan, which, given its global vision and multi-annual nature, is the central planning instrument of the Tax Agency, established the direction of the Tax Agency's activity for these years. This Plan incorporates an annual addendum with new strategic objectives to keep it permanently updated.

Recently, by Resolution of February 6, 2023 of the General Directorate of the State Tax Administration Agency, the general guidelines of the Annual Tax and Customs Control Plan have been approved, detailing the priority actions to be carried out by the organization in the current fiscal year 2023, in line with the provisions of the Strategic Plan and its addenda.

The general guidelines revolve around five main pillars:

• Information and assistance.

• Prevention of non-compliance. Promoting voluntary compliance and preventing fraud.

• Investigation and verification of tax and customs fraud.

• Fraud control in the collection phase.

• Collaboration between the Tax Agency and the tax authorities of the Autonomous Communities.

The first of the pillars mentioned above establishes, for 2023, significant improvements in the information and assistance service for taxpayers, not only in compliance with an obligation to taxpayers, but with the conviction that the provision of this service constitutes the best way to prevent fraud, by facilitating compliance with tax obligations and minimising the indirect costs associated with it.

The new information and assistance model promoted in these general guidelines, which is already being implemented, integrates all existing information channels (in person, by telephone and online) in an attempt to make it easier for citizens to decide which modality they wish to be served by within the range of services available for each of the established services. In this regard, work is also being done to enhance and improve face-to-face care for the elderly, or people who may be affected by the digital divide.

Work is also underway to update the Tax Agency's service charter, which will be available on the Electronic Office and in the Tax Agency's offices, to improve citizens' knowledge of them and enable a faster, easier and more effective relationship between taxpayers and the Tax Agency.

Along these lines, a new appointment application has been launched on the Electronic Office that uses more understandable language and presents simpler and more intuitive navigation. In addition to the already existing service of confirmation of the appointment obtained through SMS  and email, an appointment reminder service has been introduced to reiterate the assigned day and time well in advance.

As regards the information and assistance provided by telephone, the provision of these services is being unified by promoting a single centralised service that will integrate all the services provided up to now, stratifying the levels of assistance and improving the tools used, the identification and authentication systems and the quality of the information provided.

Other important improvements included in the general guidelines of the Control Plan include the review of the criteria for imposing penalties, the establishment of a new general policy on deferrals and instalment payments, and the implementation of new systems for correcting minor tax breaches in Personal Income Tax.

Furthermore, with an eye on the upcoming 2022 Income Tax Campaign, improvements continue to be made to the Renta WEB service, the "Income Informer" and the "Income Informer for Economic Activities" are being improved, and decisive progress is being made in the design of the Virtual Income Tax Assistant.

With regard to corporate tax, the general guidelines provide for the provision of more tax data to taxpayers: data relating to tax credits from previous years pending application –calculated based on what was declared in previous years– and information on the accounting adjustments made in the previous year.

Work will also be done on the possibility of bringing forward the refunds of corporate tax returns for small and medium-sized companies.

Finally, the general guidelines of the Annual Tax and Customs Control Plan for 2023 include an important line of improvement in the administrative activity of the Tax Agency: the simplification of the most commonly used administrative documents in the different areas that make up the Tax Agency.