Supplementing regulations that tax officials should only be responsible for handling tax records and tax refund records in accordance with their duties and responsibilities and in compliance with legal regulations. Photo: Internet

Limitation of tax officials' liability

Data from the General Department of Taxation shows that in the first 9 months of 2024, the Tax authority issued 13,762 VAT refund decisions with a total refund amount of VND 101,167 billion, equal to 59.2% of the decentralized tax refund estimate in 2024, equal to 100.1% compared to the same period in 2023.

This figure shows that although there has been an improvement compared to the same period in 2023, the tax refund progress is still slower than the estimate.

At this rate, it is likely that tax refunds would not reach the target set at the beginning of the year.

To remove bottlenecks and promote tax refunds, the Tax sector has proposed a number of important solutions in the draft amendments to the Law on Value Added Tax and the Law on Tax Administration.

According to Ms. Nguyen Quynh Anh, Vice President of the Vietnam Bar Federation, the amendment of the Law on Tax Administration must ensure the State budget revenue but must also have a mechanism to protect tax officials and create business development.

Believing that the current tax law, especially the Law on Tax Administration, does not limit the responsibility of tax officials, Ms. Nguyen Quynh Anh emphasized that this inadvertently leads to tax officials having to take the highest responsibility when making decisions to handle a tax issue to ensure that their decisions are absolutely safe and do not cause budget losses.

Accordingly, Ms. Nguyen Quynh Anh recommended that the legislature study and add provisions to the Law on Value Added Tax and the Law on Tax Administration to limit the responsibility of tax officials. Tax officials should only be responsible for handling tax records and tax refund records in accordance with their duties and responsibilities and in compliance with the provisions of the law.

This will solve the bottleneck of VAT refunds, contributing to creating a stable and flexible policy environment for both taxpayers and tax authorities.

Regarding this issue, Mr. Nguyen Van Phung, member of the Central Executive Committee of the Vietnam Association of Accountants and Auditors, former Director of the Department of Large Enterprise Tax Management (General Department of Taxation) said that in order to harmonize the interests of the state and enterprises, ministries, branches and localities must have consistent guidance in the way of looking at handling tax violations, specifically the violation at which stage will be resolved at that stage, not putting the responsibility solely on the tax authority and tax officials.

It is necessary to clearly define the responsibilities of tax officials in the Law on VAT and the Law on Tax Administration, in which tax officials are only responsible for reviewing documents according to the provisions of law.

Regarding this issue, in the process of drafting the amended Law on VAT expected to be passed at the ongoing 8th Session of the 15th National Assembly, the General Department of Taxation has reported to the Ministry of Finance to propose adding to the draft Law a provision that tax officials are responsible for tax refunds in accordance with their duties and responsibilities, complying with the provisions of the law on VAT, the law on tax management within the scope of records and documents provided by taxpayers, and information documents provided by competent state agencies related to the settlement of tax refund dossiers to ensure strictness and the scope of responsibility of tax officials in settling tax refund dossiers.

Decentralization, delegation of authority, avoiding the accumulation of tax refund dossiers at tax departments

Along with the proposal to supplement the responsibilities of tax officials, in the draft revised Law on Tax Administration, the drafting agency proposed to amend the regulations on the authority to decide on tax refunds. Accordingly, the Ministry of Finance proposed to amend and supplement Clause 1, Article 76 in the direction of supplementing the authority to decide on tax refunds of the Director of the Department of Taxation of large enterprises, the head of the tax branch and the head of the regional tax branch.

Explaining this supplement, the Ministry of Finance said that Article 2 of the current Law on Tax Administration stipulates that tax agencies including the General Department of Taxation, tax departments, tax branches and regional tax branches that have the right to decide on tax refunds.

According to Article 72 of the Law on Tax Administration, the tax agency directly managing the taxpayer receives tax refund dossiers for cases eligible for tax refunds according to the provisions of the law on tax.

Clause 1, Article 76 of the Law on Tax Administration only stipulates that the Director of the Tax Department of a province or municipal city has the authority to decide on tax refunds in cases of tax refunds in accordance with the provisions of the law on tax, but there is no provision stipulating the authority to refund taxes of the Director of the Tax Department of Large Enterprises, the Director of the Tax Sub-department and the Director of the Regional Tax Sub-department.

Meanwhile, the current regulation assigns the Tax Department of Large Enterprises to manage a number of large corporations and general companies. Therefore, when VAT refunds arise from large corporations and general companies, they must be transferred to local tax departments for settlement.

This regulation has not created favorable conditions for taxpayers, causing the settlement of tax refund dossiers to be delayed because they are all concentrated in tax departments, negatively affecting tax refund activities, taxpayers, organizations and individuals involved.

The drafting agency also said that according to current law, taxpayers directly managed by the tax department will have their refund dossiers received by the tax department, but the head of the tax department does not have the authority to decide on tax refunds.

Therefore, it is necessary to amend and supplement the regulations on the authority to decide on tax refunds; the tax agency directly managing the taxpayer is responsible for receiving the tax refund dossiers and handling the tax refunds.

This regulation will avoid shifting responsibility between the tax sub-department and the tax department, limiting the accumulation of tax refund dossiers at the tax departments.

Adding two more tax refund levels, the tax sub-department and the large enterprise tax department, is expected to speed up the tax refund process for enterprises.

“If we decentralize and delegate authority, tax refunds will be faster. Because, with the current process, the person who receives the tax refund dossiers is still the head of the tax sub-department.

They submit them to the tax department and the tax department must open an appraisal council. This does not enhance the role of the tax sub-departments in tax refunds.

Therefore, with the proposal to delegate authority and responsibility to the levels assigned to the tax refund role, they will have to implement it more systematically," Mr. Nguyen Van Phung affirmed.

According to the assessment, when decentralizing the authority of tax branches to consider tax refunds for the records under their management, it will create conditions to shorten the time for considering tax refunds.