On 25 February 2020 the OECD issued guidance on the the technical implementation of the TRACE initiative (Treaty Relief and Compliance Enhancement), together with the relevant IT formats. The TRACE system permits claims to be made in relation to withholding tax relief at source on portfolio investments and simplifies compliance by removing administrative barriers that would otherwise affect claims for reduced rates of withholding tax.
The release of the standardised IT format supporting information reporting under TRACE is in response to interest in the implementation of TRACE by a number of jurisdictions.
The OECD has also issued guidance to facilitate the wider use of the OECD Common Transmission System (CTS) for the exchange of information between tax administrations under the common reporting standard.
Also released was a dedicated XML Schema and User Guide permitting feedback by tax administrations on errors found in tax information exchanged through the CTS. Later in 2020 the CTS will also support other information exchanges such as on-request and spontaneous exchanges of information and information relating to the Mutual Agreement Procedure (MAP).
The Generic Status Message XML Schema will permit feedback by tax administrations in relation to the technical quality of the information exchanged.
