THE GOVERNMENT recently issued an emergency decree aimed at incentivising taxpayers to regularise their tax affairs on a forward-looking basis.
Any tax examination, inquiry, assessment, payment demands or criminal prosecution in respect of income generated prior to January 1, 2016, will be waived.
The emergency decree for the so-called tax audit exemption programme is now in force and available to taxpayers. Companies and juristic partnerships whose revenue does not exceed Bt500 million for any accounting period ending on or before December 31, 2015, can apply for the programme.
This would include small and medium-sized enterprises, which are companies with paid-up capital not exceeding Bt5 million and annual turnover not exceeding Bt30 million.
The audit exemption will apply to income tax, value-added tax, specific business tax (SBT), withholding tax and/or stamp duty due by an eligible company, juristic partnership or SME if such taxes relate to income generated or expenses incurred in any accounting period ending on or before December 31, 2015.
If the eligible company, juristic partnership or SME wishes to apply for the tax audit exemption programme, it must notify and register with the Revenue Department before March 15.
In addition, the eligible company, juristic partnership or SME must, from January 1, 2016, onwards, prepare accounting records and financial statements that reflect an accurate financial position of the business and comply with all tax obligations for the accounting periods commencing on or after January 1 and commit no action resulting in the avoidance to pay any tax from that date.
Failure to comply with such conditions will result in the tax audit exemption programme being revoked retrospectively from January 1, 2016.
This programme is part of the government's measures to strengthen SMEs with a single set of accounts and encourage them to comply with the tax laws. There is no doubt that this is also meant to bring more taxpayers into the system and encourage tax compliance, which should, in the long term, improve overall revenue collection.
Taxpayers are often reluctant to correct non-compliance voluntarily, as they are concerned that doing so may trigger a tax audit for previous years. This could both be time-consuming and result in additional liabilities. Thus the intention of this programme is to provide certainty to taxpayers that no tax audit will be conducted by the Revenue Department in respect of past years.
Despite that promise, there is a concern among some taxpayers that the Revenue Department will specifically scrutinise and audit the future tax periods of eligible companies, partnerships or SMEs that have opted into the tax audit exemption programme. It is therefore imperative that the taxpayers that decide to take advantage of the programme correctly administer their tax affairs going forward.
The programme may be particularly advantageous to taxpayers with a history of tax non-compliance, in the context of acquisition of an entity with historic tax exposures, or taxpayers planning to expand their business, especially in light of future opportunities presented by the Asean Economic Community.