From 26 to 28 March 2019 the twelfth plenary meeting of the OECD Forum on Tax Administration (FTA) took place with delegates including senior tax officials, business representatives and international organisations. The main themes discussed were delivering on BEPS and tax certainty; improving tax co-operation; supporting the continued digitalisation of tax administrations; and capacity building for developing countries.

BEPS and delivering tax certainty

An expanded pilot of the international compliance assurance programme (ICAP 2.0) has been launched. This approach allows taxpayers and tax administrations to work together to carry out tax risk assessment in relation to the main international tax risks. Currently a total of 17 tax administrations have agreed to take part in ICAP 2.0 with several other FTA members looking at the possibility of taking part later. The FTA is supporting the development of ICAP with the eventual aim of establishing a mature and continuing programme of risk assessment.

Based on the extensive information available as a result of BEPS measures further work also continues on helping tax administrations to understand the key indicators that tax risk may exist and the type of information required to carry out an effective risk assessment.

The FTA carried forward its work on joint international audits by publishing “Joint Audit 2019 – Enhancing Tax Co-operation and Improving Tax Certainty”. The FTA is increasingly replacing separate uncoordinated audits of the same or related issues with joint audits where this is appropriate

The FTA MAP Forum is looking at other ways to increase tax certainty and is working with the FTA Large Business International Programme to look at improvements that can be made to the APA process and promoting wider use of multilateral APAs and MAPs. The FTA is also looking at the potential sharing of benchmarks in standard situations in transfer pricing.

Improving tax co-operation

The meeting discussed how to move forward on ensuring the effective taxation of sales goods and services in the sharing and gig economy through digital platforms. A report issued by the FTA entitled “The Sharing and Gig Economy: Effective Taxation of Platform Sellers” puts forward three recommendations for future work. These involve engagement with sharing and gig economy platforms to inform the platform sellers about their tax obligations; improvement of the evidence to allow a more accurate estimate of the amount of tax at risk; and help for policy makers in developing a standardised reporting model that would allow an increased exchange of information between tax administrations.

Supporting digital transformation

The FTA is collaborating on exploring the use of new technologies, analytical tools and data sources to enhance compliance, create efficiencies and improve taxpayer services. Three reports were published during the meeting to provide practical assistance to tax administrations including “Unlocking the Digital Economy – A Guide to Implementing Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) in Government”;

The report entitled “Implementing Online Cash Registers: Benefits, Considerations and Guidance” looks at how the advances in digital technology can help to reduce the vulnerability of cash register data to manipulation, including the use of online cash registers where appropriate.

“Introducing a Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) Software Solution: The Experience of the Finish Tax Administration” looks specifically at how Tax Finland has replaced numerous software systems with a Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) product.

A new framework known as Tax Administration 2030 will outline the path towards digital transformation. The FTA will look at how the new technology and new processes can be used to enhance tax compliance and reduce compliance burdens for taxpayers, focusing particularly on small and medium enterprises.

Building capacity

The Capacity Building Network helps FTA members coordinate their capacity building contributions. The FTA is piloting the use of “maturity models” to help tax administrations build their own capability. Other aims include the development of e-learning and greater use of the Knowledge Sharing Platform for information sharing, training and improved co-ordination. In relation to human resources needs the FTA also launched the FTA Gender Balance Network aiming to improve gender balance in leadership positions.