Starting from Friday, 18 December, companies and natural persons will be able to alleviate their temporary solvency issues using a new service on E-Tax Board/e-Customs to schedule their tax payments in instalments, thereby avoiding the inclusion in the list of tax debtors.
According to Ruth Paade, head of the Revenue Department at Estonian Tax and Customs Board, the new service allows electronic and automated administration of applications to pay tax arrears in instalments and adds more flexibility in settling the tax payments. "We have taken on board feedback that it should be possible to apply for a payment plan for the payment of taxes even before the potential tax debt is incurred. In that case, the person is also able to stay out of the list of tax debtors," Paade said.
The process of applying for a payment plan can be tracked in E-Tax Board/e-Customs throughout and typically a request is displayed to confirm your payment plan already after the final submission of the application. If the monthly payment or payment period of the proposed payment plan is found unsuitable after all, the solvency calculator is a tool that is available. It calculates the average monthly available balance based upon entered income and expenses.
In addition, we help those currently on a payment plan to stay up to date on whether their payments are made according to plan. For that purpose, we send automated emails or telephone text messages and we ask you to contact us in case problems arise in order to work out a better solution.
The Estonian Tax and Customs Board typically receives on average 500 applications per month for setting up payment plans to pay tax debt in instalments. Most of them are for less than 10,000 euros and are due in up to 12 months. The new solution enables payment plan applications involving such amounts and payment periods to be submitted using a simplified procedure that will be decided automatically. If the tax debt subject to payment plan is higher than 10,000 euros or the requested payment period is longer than 12 months, all previous steps can be completed as described in E-Tax Board/e-Customs but in that case the application will be subject to a more extensive review and advice is provided where necessary to help overcome the temporary issues with tax payment.
Due to us transitioning to a new electronic payment plan service, the submission of electronic payment plan applications will be temporarily disabled on the Estonian Tax and Customs Board website from 14 December to 17 December. Until then, digitally signed payment plan applications can be submitted via email or at service centres.
The cost of the new electronic payment plan service was approximately 200,000 euros and it was financed by the European Regional Development Fund.
28th of December 2015