Tax officials and relevant authorities gather in a press conference reviewing the fight against smuggling, trade fraud and fake goods in the third quarter in Hà Nội last week. — Photo cand.com.v

HÀ NỘI — Due to the rapid development of e-commerce, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, regulating the sector has become increasingly complex for tax authorities, according to Vũ Mạnh Cường, director of the Inspection Section under the General Department of Taxation (GDT).

Cường was speaking at a press conference reviewing the fight against smuggling, trade fraud and fake goods in Hà Nội last week.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has enhanced the habit of buying and selling via e-commerce, mostly in Hà Nội and HCM City, with developed information technology platforms," Cường said.

He said the tax industry has accelerated efforts to collect tax from those who do business on e-commerce platforms, especially YouTube, Google and Facebook, and found tax violators.

Cường said they have collected tax arrears of VNĐ13.9 billion (US$604,000) from those earning a living from social networks.

According to data provided by commercial banks, there were 18,304 individuals and organisations that earned VNĐ1.462 trillion on Google, Facebook and YouTube so far this year.

Per the Law on Cyber ​​Security, Cường said foreign enterprises earning income in Việt Nam are obliged to declare and pay taxes with local tax authorities, with Netflix included.

“With the case of Netflix, we have co-ordinated with the Anti-Money Laundering Department from the State Bank of Vietnam to list how much tax is to be collected for its activities in the past few years."

"Netflix leaders have worked with the Ministry of Finance and the GDT to set up a data office in Việt Nam as well as carry out all relating tax obligations," he added.

Cường said the taxation industry has deployed many solutions and worked with other ministries and departments to collect e-commerce taxes. It has worked with the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), the ministry of Information Communication (MIC) to collect information and data and management measures for online business activities to tax offices.

At the same time, local commercial banks were responsible for providing data of relating online trading requested by the GDT so tax officials can make a database to compile a tax management mechanism for businesses in the e-commerce sector. — VNS