Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Tax revenue up 4.4% in FY2014/15, with individual income tax collected rising 16%

While GST collection and betting taxes rose 7.4% and 8.9%, respectively, stamp duty collected fell S$1.1 billion in Financial Year 2014/15 compared to the previous year, the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore said. 

23 Sep 2015
SINGAPORE: A total of S$43.4 billion was collected in tax revenue in Financial Year 2014/15, the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore announced, up 4.4 per cent from the collection in the previous Financial Year.

This amount represents 71.3 per cent of the Government Operating Revenue, IRAS said in a media release on Wednesday (Sep 23).






Of the total figure, 54 per cent, or S$23.4 billion, was collected in Income Tax, including Corporate Income Tax, Individual Income Tax and Withholding Tax, IRAS said.

Contributing to the increase were improved corporate profits which raised Corporate Income Tax collection by 5.4 per cent over the previous Financial Year, as well as the 16 per cent increase in Individual Income Tax collection due to higher individual earnings.





IRAS said "moderate growth" in private consumption expenditure drove an increase in GST collection, from S$9.5 billion in FY2013/14 to S$10.2 billion in FY2014/15 - a rise of 7.4 per cent.

Stamp duty collection decreased from S$3.9 billion in FY2013/14 to S$2.8 billion in FY2014/15, due to a lower volume of property transactions in the wake of property market cooling measures.

About S$2.6 billion in Betting Taxes was collected in FY2014/15, representing an 8.9 per cent increase from FY2013/14, due to higher collections from Betting Duty following the upward revision of Betting Duty rate from Jul 1, 2014.

TAX AND TECHNOLOGY
IRAS said a move to keep the tax system "simple and robust" made tax collection more efficient, with on-time filing and on-time payment rates of 90 per cent on average across all tax types.

Such moves included the rollout of the online filing of tax returns to all companies regardless of annual revenue in June this year, as well as the Preview Notice of Assessment, in which more than 1.3 million taxpayers on the No-Filing Service were able to preview their tax bills and request an early assessment.

As a consequence, the cost of tax collection was kept low, at S$0.0082 for every dollar of tax collected - 5 per cent lower than S$0.086 in FY2013/14. Tax arrears also remained low at 0.81 per cent of total net tax assessed, IRAS said.

In FY2014/15, IRAS said it audited and investigated close to 13,000 tax evasion/fraud cases and recovered more than S$450 million in taxes and penalties, in part thanks to the use of business analytics to match and analyse data, as well as identify taxpayers with higher risk profiles.

"We will continue to simplify the tax rules and filing and payment processes, thereby enhancing voluntary compliance," said IRAS Commissioner Tan Tee How.



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