Slow response, enterprises request HCMC tax authority to clearly state the deadline for responding to official dispatches

Many businesses have reported slow responses to official dispatches and unclear guidance from tax authorities. Some said they had sent documents for months but had not received a response.

Looking forward to being guided to complete tax obligations

At the Business - City Government Dialogue Conference to resolve difficulties and problems regarding tax settlement and some notes on tax policies held on December 5 in Ho Chi Minh City, a representative of Viet Nhat Transport Company Limited said that they are facing difficulties in completing tax obligations of the company's representative office in Ho Chi Minh City.

Specifically, during the procedure, tax officers required the company to submit additional declarations of business license tax (business license fees) for each year, from 2017 to 2025 (because the company submitted the declaration late for 2017, it must submit additional declarations for the following years until 2025).

The company submitted the additional business license fee declaration for the 2017 tax period to the representative office using the parent company's tax code account (Japan) and was received by the tax authority on September 4.

However, the tax officer requires the unit to submit the declaration using the tax code account of the representative office. Meanwhile, the representative office does not have legal status, seal and digital signature, so it cannot submit the declaration using its tax code.

On October 17, Viet Nhat Company sent a dispatch to the Ho Chi Minh City tax authority to request detailed instructions on the above procedures. To date, the company has not received any response. "We hope to receive guidance from the tax authority to complete our tax obligations and carry out procedures to terminate the representative office's operations according to regulations," said a company representative.

HCMC Tax representatives answer questions from businesses. (Photo: ITPC)

Answering questions from businesses, Ms. Do Le Mai Tram, Deputy Head of Business Management and Support Department No. 3 (HCMC Tax), said that Decree No. 139/2016 dated October 4, 2016 stipulates that branches and representative offices at business locations must pay business license fees.

According to Decree 126/2020 of the Government , in case a company's branch or representative office has dependent accounting in a different province/city than the head office, the place to submit the business license fee declaration is the tax authority managing the dependent unit or business location.

In case the dependent accounting branches are located in the same province or city as the head office, the business license fee is paid to the tax authority managing the head office.

"Regarding specific documents, businesses are requested to contact the tax authority directly (Business Management and Support Department No. 3) for resolution," Ms. Tram replied.

However, the representative of Viet Nhat Company was not satisfied with the response from the tax authority and affirmed that the unit had repeatedly contacted the officer in charge of processing the company's tax records but had not received a resolution.

Therefore, the company came to this dialogue to ask for guidance from the tax authorities.

In response to the concerns of businesses, Mr. Giang Van Hien, Deputy Head of Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department, assigned Ms. Do Le Mai Tram to directly receive information and coordinate with businesses to handle related procedures. If necessary, tax officers can submit to leaders to handle for businesses.

Tax authorities need to clearly state the deadline for responding to official dispatches.

Also related to the issue of resolving administrative procedures in the tax field, Ms. Nguyen Hai Yen, representative of Agest Vietnam Co., Ltd., informed that when implementing tax policies, businesses encounter problems that need support.

In addition, this company has Japanese investment capital and always needs official responses from the authorities for legal issues. However, for each document, the company has to send it many times because it does not receive a response from the HCMC Tax Department.

Ms. Yen commented that the tax authorities' response to businesses was not timely and accurate. Meanwhile, businesses only want to be supported quickly and promptly to declare and pay taxes fully to the state in accordance with the law.

"I propose that when receiving documents, tax authorities should clearly state the response time so that businesses do not waste time waiting and sending documents multiple times," Ms. Yen said.

Many businesses attended the dialogue session of the Ho Chi Minh City tax authority. (Photo: ITPC)

Regarding the problem in sending documents to the tax authority, the Deputy Head of Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department said: "The tax authority understands this problem."

According to Mr. Giang Van Hien, in the past, when sending documents to the tax authority, businesses had to wait because the assignment process involved many different functional departments. As a result, tracking documents and supporting businesses was not timely.

Currently, the tax industry has changed the model from "management by function combined with objects" to "management by objects combined with functions". Recently, Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department has had staff directly managing enterprises. Questions and problems of enterprises will be handled by specialized staff.

"We have transformed the model and have specialized departments and direct business management officers to closely monitor the responses for businesses. Companies can directly discuss with tax management officers or send documents to tax authorities to quickly receive responses," said the leader of Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department.

Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department is managing over 500,000 enterprises. Of these, the private economic sector accounts for 96% and contributes nearly 60% of the state budget revenue in Ho Chi Minh City.

It is estimated that the cumulative budget revenue of Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department in the first 11 months of the year is 555,939 billion VND, reaching 110.77% of the budget estimate assigned by the Government and 106% of the estimate assigned by the City People's Council. The cumulative revenue in the first 11 months also increased by 20.49% over the same period. After 11 months, Ho Chi Minh City Tax Department has completed the budget collection task assigned by the Government and the City People's Council.

After the merger, local budget revenue also grew strongly compared to the same period. From July to November, budget revenue reached VND 261,977 billion, equal to 137.6% compared to the same period in 2024.

Tax settlement is not completed, businesses say tax officers do not understand the problem . Businesses have been completing tax settlement documents for many months now but have not completed them and have had to go to the tax office many times.

Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/cham-phan-hoi-dn-de-nghi-co-quan-thue-tphcm-neu-ro-thoi-han-tra-loi-cong-van-2469749.html