Digitalization and Taxes: E-Government

Digitalization is taking over our everyday lives and hardly any area remains unaffected. The tax sector too cannot escape progress. In our article series on "Digitalization and Taxes", we show you the challenges digitalization brings with it, but also the advantages.

Electronic tax services are still in development

‍In most cases, fortunately, digitalization makes our lives easier. Many things that used to require a huge amount of effort can now be accomplished with just a few clicks. Handling things electronically not only saves paper but primarily time as well. This includes an increasing number of government services that can be processed electronically. This is referred to as E-Government. The most frequently used example of E-Government in Switzerland is the electronic tax declaration, which is already used by 47% of businesses and 64% of the population. However, there is still potential for optimization: Declarations are still sent to taxpayers by mail and many documents must also still be submitted in paper form. Another example is the federal tax portal «ESTV SuisseTax», where services related to value-added tax, withholding tax, and automatic information exchange can be handled electronically. This portal particularly targets companies, and 25% of VAT-liable companies in Switzerland are currently using the electronic VAT declaration. However, for many of the electronically offered services, currently only the interface to the taxpayer is digitalized; the processes behind them are often not yet.

‍Job loss as a challenge of digitalization

‍By digitalizing its services, the state can save on wage costs, as a large number of civil servant positions could be eliminated through the automation of processes. The saved funds would then either benefit the taxpayers through tax reductions or be used in another area. However, this advantage also brings with it one of the major challenges of the future: People who have lost their jobs due to digitalization need to find employment in another area.

‍Making tax declarations easy – with Taxea.ch

‍You can easily create your tax declaration using our tax app taxea. Learn more about taxea here www.taxea.ch