Summary (comprehensive) analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of tax payment
(A) the advantages of consolidated (consolidated) tax payment are mainly reflected in five aspects.
1. You can get the benefit of deferred tax payment. Summary tax payment can offset the profits and losses of internal branches or subsidiaries, that is, the losses of one enterprise in the group can offset the profits of other enterprises. Enterprises can use the deferred tax payment time with time difference to obtain certain tax benefits. This is equivalent to an interest-free loan provided by the tax authorities, which is conducive to the development of enterprise groups.
2. It can improve the risk tolerance of enterprise groups. Summary (merger) tax payment makes the risks among group members relatively dispersed, and a large number of losses of individual members can be shared by reducing the current tax burden of other members of the group, which objectively reduces the risk of enterprise groups entering other fields, enables enterprise groups to realize diversification and globalization of operations, thereby enhancing the competitiveness of enterprise groups in the international market and improving the international trade status of domestic enterprises. Because of its strong risk tolerance, enterprise groups can become shock absorbers of the market and play an active role in stable economic growth. At present, the world-famous large enterprise groups are diversified, which are easier to survive in the economic recession than other small and medium-sized enterprises, showing strong market risk tolerance.
3. Dividend income in enterprise groups can be deducted from taxable income, and there is no problem of paying taxes according to tax rate differences.
4. It is conducive to strengthening the supervision of the head office or the parent company of the group on the income tax declaration and payment of the member companies, so that the member companies can fulfill their tax obligations more standardized and consciously.
5. For tax authorities, it can reduce the collection objects, reduce the complexity of tax collection and management, reduce the level and workload of tax collection and management, and at the same time ensure that taxes are put into storage on time and in full, thus reducing tax costs and improving the efficiency of tax collection and management.
(2) The shortcomings of consolidated (consolidated) tax payment are mainly reflected in three aspects:
1. All companies in the group must use the same tax year, and it is difficult to change the consolidated tax method in future years.
2. To a certain extent, it will affect the tax revenue of the country, and it is also easy for enterprises to consciously carry out tax planning and avoid family tax. For example, the current tax law stipulates that affiliated enterprises should reorganize by selling assets. If the acquirer regards the acquired unit as a non-independent accounting unit, the profits or losses realized by the acquired company shall be consolidated with the head office for tax payment. Therefore, when the company is profitable, it can reduce the taxable income by acquiring the loss-making affiliated companies, so as to achieve the purpose of paying less or not paying taxes.
3. Summary (consolidated) tax payment is technically complicated and needs to be supplemented by advanced monitoring and auditing means, which may increase the tax payment cost.
Two, enterprise group summary (merger) problems in the actual implementation of tax payment
(a) Policy issues
1. The conditions for member companies are too harsh. Only subsidiaries of the parent company holding 100% assets can participate in consolidated tax payment, and once the shareholding ratio changes, consolidated tax payment will be introduced in the year when it changes. This strict restriction is not conducive to the implementation of the consolidated tax policy. With the deepening of enterprise reform in China, the shareholding system has become a development trend, and most newly-built enterprises adopt the shareholding system. In addition, many enterprises of the former South parent company 1.000% have also been reorganized into joint-stock enterprises, and fewer and fewer enterprises meet the conditions of consolidated tax payment, which makes the consolidated tax payment policy lose its due significance to enterprise groups.
2. The parent company (head office) has two jobs, and the reporting workload is heavy. The parent company (head office) is not only a member enterprise that collects (merges) taxes, but also a remittance enterprise that shoulders the functions of collecting all member enterprises, and declares and pays enterprise income tax to the tax authorities in a dual capacity. That is, on the one hand, as a member enterprise, it should submit the tax return of its own department to the local tax authorities in accordance with the provisions of local prepayment, and pay the tax in advance; On the other hand, as remittance enterprises, it is necessary to summarize the declaration forms of member enterprises on a monthly or quarterly basis, declare remittances on a monthly or quarterly basis, and pay remittance tax. The final settlement workload after the end of the year is even greater. In addition, the head office has declared two sets of declaration forms, but the name of the applicant can only be the name of the parent company (Zonggongzhou). Because the merged (merged) tax-paying enterprise has only one tax code in tax collection management, if a tax-paying enterprise declares in two ways, and the computer system does not support it, the competent tax authorities can only accept manual declaration, and a lot of data can only be completed by manual statistics such as manual accounts, which is inefficient and easy to make mistakes.
3. The division between the head office and remittance enterprises has brought about contradictions in the implementation of specific policies. In order to enhance the overall image of the group, enterprise groups usually carry out overall publicity when they publicize. However, the current tax law stipulates that the pre-tax deduction of advertising fees in that year cannot exceed 2% of operating income. Because the group is mostly a management organization and has no operating income, the advertising fee cannot be charged before tax, because the group is managed as a member enterprise that collects taxes. The same is true for business hospitality. Group companies are mostly responsible for external reception and communication, but business entertainment expenses are deducted according to a certain proportion of income. As an independent taxpayer, the group company must evaluate each tax item separately, so that the advertising fee and business entertainment fee cannot be deducted before tax.
4. Compensation for losses and tax refund. Because member enterprises pay taxes in different proportions in different places, if some members make profits in the local area and pay taxes in advance, and then lose money in the next quarter or other members lose money, the taxes paid in advance in the local area will often be refunded locally and rejected by the headquarters, which is contrary to the support policy of consolidated tax payment.
5. The advance payment ratio of member enterprises is diverse, which is difficult to operate. For enterprises that implement the "unified calculation, hierarchical management, local prepayment and centralized liquidation" summary (merger) tax payment mode, the General Administration adopts the method of one household and one batch, some of which are 15% of taxable income, some are 15% of taxable income and some are 60% of taxable income. After summarizing, the profit and loss are flat, and the enterprise has no applicable tax rate at all.
(b) Management issues
1. There are many uncertainties in summary tax payment. The enterprises that implement consolidated tax payment are all large domestic enterprises, such as financial insurance, telecommunications, petrochemical and so on. Although tax authorities from State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China to all levels attach great importance to the collection and management of summary tax enterprises, there are many levels of summary tax enterprises, that is, there are two, three and four member enterprises, and they are easily affected by enterprise reorganization, restructuring and macro-policy adjustment. The situation of tax sources fluctuates greatly and there are many uncertain factors, which brings many problems to tax collection and management.
2. The supervision of enterprises by tax authorities in the supervision area is not in place. Although the summary enterprise accepted local supervision and found that the illegal amount was paid on the spot, because there was no assessment index for tax storage, the tax authorities in the place of operation did not pay attention to it, forming a situation of "whether to ask or not". Local supervision of consolidated tax payment member enterprises is often a mere formality, and it is impossible to carry out strict substantive tax inspection, nor can it punish the problems found according to regulations. However, the tax authorities where tax paying enterprises pay taxes are often "out of control" due to their own personnel strength, data collection, work coordination and other factors. This is not conducive to mobilizing the enthusiasm and initiative of the tax authorities in the place of business to strengthen enterprise supervision, nor to the management and collection of the tax authorities in the place of tax payment.
3. The enforcement of tax authorities is not enough. Due to the distribution of remittance member enterprises in different places, different industries and management levels, and the different management methods and accounting methods, the tax authorities at the provincial, prefectural and county levels have the responsibility of supervision, which makes this work characterized by multi-level supervision and complicated policies and business. At present, many specific regulations have been formulated for the taxation and finance of remittance enterprises according to different industries and groups. Due to the particularity of consolidated tax paying enterprises, tax officials are not familiar with the financial system, policies and regulations of such enterprises, and there are problems such as inconsistent policies and insufficient law enforcement in their work.
4. In the organizational arrangement of tax management, there is a phenomenon of disjointed management. For a long time, the expense standard of consolidated (consolidated) tax-paying enterprises has been completely approved by higher authorities, and many enterprises have not included or included taxable income or expanded pre-tax deduction to varying degrees. The main manifestations are: first, collecting wages and agency fees beyond the prescribed standards; Second, over-standard provision of trade union funds, education funds and employee welfare funds; Third, capital expenditures such as fixed assets are charged before tax. Items that should be adjusted according to the provisions of the tax law are not adjusted according to the provisions. The tax authorities responsible for summarizing (summarizing) the payment can only calculate and pay by the summary table, and cannot audit whether the tax items to be adjusted are adjusted, the income amount and the deduction items are accurate.
5. Policy propaganda and business training are not in place, and there is a lack of coordination, contact and cooperation between tax enterprises. On the one hand, the tax authorities can't keep up with the policy propaganda and explanation of enterprises, some accounting personnel of enterprises are not familiar with tax policies and certain financial regulations, and some tax personnel are not fully aware of new policies and regulations; On the other hand, enterprises lack the consciousness of active declaration and supervision, and think that the profits and losses of enterprises are summarized by superiors in the middle of the year, and the daily accounting can be done as long as it conforms to the accounting system, and the feedback information after settlement is not provided as required.
Thirdly, the enlightenment of foreign aggregation (merger) model to China.
After more than half a century's development, the system and management of income tax consolidation in western countries have tended to be standardized. Its practice mainly includes:
1. The main performance is summary tax payment, which generally does not exist. Because the income tax in western countries is enterprise income tax or corporate income tax, and independent legal persons are taxpayers, rather than independent accounting enterprises as taxpayers in China's income tax, unincorporated branches do not need to pay income tax. Therefore, the income tax of western countries generally does not exist in the head office of China.
2. There are generally strict restrictions on consolidated tax payment. For example, the United States stipulates that consolidated tax returns must meet four conditions: First, the parent company is a resident company; Second, the parent company owns 80% or more of the voting shares of its subsidiaries; Third, subsidiaries registered abroad (except Canada and Mexico) cannot be merged with American groups to declare and pay taxes; Fourth, the parent company and its subsidiaries agree in writing to jointly declare income tax. Judging from the tax policies of various countries, the restrictive conditions for consolidated (consolidated) tax payment mainly focus on the controlling shares, that is, the size of the shares held by the parent company in its subsidiaries becomes the key to whether consolidated tax payment can be carried out. Although the results of tax collection (merger) are different, the function of * * * is that the profits and losses of different members of the company group can offset each other. However, this tax treatment generally only involves domestic member companies, excluding foreign subsidiaries. The conditions for allowing consolidated tax payment vary from country to country.
3. Different countries have different group tax systems. Generally can be divided into three categories:
(1) A complete tax consolidation system. Consider the group itself as a taxpayer, and the transactions between all members of the group have nothing to do with tax payment, and calculate the taxable income from the perspective of the whole group. The Netherlands and Australia adopt this system. The applicable conditions are that the parent company must hold more than 95% of the shares of its subsidiaries, and the fiscal year and financial system of all companies must be consistent. The assets and liabilities of each member of the group can be distributed to the parent company, and the balance sheet and income statement of each member can be consolidated financially, and enterprise income tax can be levied on the parent company. However, subsidiaries can still pay enterprise income tax frequently, which is the tax treaty right of the entities that make up the group. In the case of enterprise income tax, companies can carry out business restructuring, and dividend distribution among companies belonging to a unified tax consortium can be tax-free in accordance with the provisions on tax exemption for equity participation.
(2)*** The sharing system is adopted, and the taxable income is calculated respectively according to the actual conditions of the entities that make up the group, and then added up as the taxable income of their superior company. At present, this system is widely used in countries, mainly Italy, Germany, France, Japan and the United States. Holding companies and controlled companies can choose to pay taxes together.
(3) Group sharing system. Calculate the taxable income according to the actual level of each company in the group. Intra-group transactions should follow the principle of independent transactions, but profit-making companies can transfer their profits to loss-making companies free of charge, so that the taxable income of profit-making companies can be reduced or even zero, and loss-making companies can also make up losses with the profits of other companies. Sweden adopts this system. It is stipulated that the profit and loss can be redistributed among the companies in the group, and the paying company is allowed to deduct the group share from the receiving company. The receiving company must include the income of the company in the taxable income, so the taxable income of the paying company will be reduced by the amount equivalent to this share, and the losses of the receiving company can also be offset by this share.
4 summary tax management is relatively standardized. The qualification for consolidated tax payment and the scope of member enterprises are clearly stipulated by laws and regulations and do not need the approval of tax authorities. For member enterprises, there is no problem of entrusting local tax authorities to supervise, let alone the division of warehousing ratio between local and parent companies and the resulting low enthusiasm of local tax authorities for supervision.
In the long run, consolidated tax payment is the direction of international unification. In modern economy, the interest relationship linked by equity (affiliated enterprises and company collectivization) has overwhelming potential in stimulating investment, increasing total demand and promoting economic growth. According to their own financial resources and development requirements, governments of all countries have formulated policies to encourage enterprise groups, one of which is to allow group enterprises to pay taxes on a consolidated basis. From the perspective of tax fairness, consolidated tax payment can better reflect the overall tax payment ability of the group, and will not lead to differences in tax treatment because taxpayers choose different investment forms (such as head office and parent company).
Four, improve the summary (merger) tax payment of enterprise groups in China.
1. appropriately relax the conditions for member enterprises to participate in consolidated (consolidated) tax payment. Because the development of enterprise groups is of great significance to China's economic development, consolidated tax payment is one of the national policies to support the development of enterprise groups. Therefore, in order to better reflect the advantages of this policy, we should consider appropriately relaxing the proportion of assets held by the parent company, expanding the scope of member enterprises, giving enterprise groups more room for tax collection (consolidation), and making the tax collection (consolidation) policy play a greater role.
2. Simplify the role of the parent company (head office) in tax collection (merger). When the parent company (head office) makes tax returns, it only appears as a remittance enterprise, and no longer makes tax returns and prepayments as a member enterprise and a remittance enterprise. That is, the parent company (head office) only declares and prepays taxes as a remittance enterprise, and all pre-tax deductions of the enterprise are uniformly calculated by the head office.
3. Banks, insurance companies, securities companies and other corporate enterprises pay taxes in a unified way, which conforms to the income tax regulations of foreign-invested enterprises and peripheral enterprises, prepares for the unification of income tax of domestic and foreign-funded enterprises, and also conforms to the operating risks and profits and losses of corporate enterprises.
4. Strengthen supervision. First, it is necessary to strengthen the daily collection and management, and urge taxpayers to declare vigorously and fulfill their tax obligations in accordance with the collection and management ideas put forward by State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China, such as "transferring the main body, clarifying responsibilities, providing good services and strengthening inspection". Second, it is necessary to improve various management systems such as tax declaration, property loss approval and tax feedback. , in strict accordance with the procedures, take the initiative to accept and approve tax-related projects related to enterprises, ensure that the rights that enterprises can enjoy are put in place, and earnestly perform their supervisory duties. Third, on the basis of self-examination, self-verification and self-payment, enterprises should focus on the annual tax inspection, intensify the investigation and punishment of illegal acts, urge enterprises to strictly enforce tax laws and regulations and financial accounting systems, and consciously safeguard the unity and seriousness of the tax law.
5. Do a good job in publicity and optimize services. Service is the basis of standardized management. Only when the tax authorities at all levels provide publicity services in place, provide taxpayers with new tax policy information in time, and do a good job in tax guidance, can taxpayers understand tax policies and regulations, consciously carry out tax payment operations, and actively cooperate with tax authorities in law enforcement.
6. Improve the quality of collection and management personnel. Starting from the requirements of specialization, we should strengthen the business training of tax personnel and enterprise financial personnel and cultivate a group of compound talents with strong professionalism. The General Administration shall organize special tax training for local tax authorities, remittance and payment enterprises and member enterprises, strengthen tax guidance, and unify the understanding and implementation of the consolidated tax policy in various places. It is suggested that the summary tax policy and some practical operations of estimation can be clearly stipulated, which is convenient for the coordination of local tax authorities and is conducive to strengthening tax collection and management.
Branch summary tax payment must meet the conditions.
In order to strengthen the management of branches and improve the efficiency of capital operation, taxpayers with unified accounting have opened deposit accounts in the name of the head office nationwide. For sales achieved in various places, the head office directly issues invoices to the buyers, and the buyers directly deposit the payment into the deposit account of the head office, or implement chain operation. How should such behavior be taxed?
Article 4 of the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Provisional Regulations on Value-added Tax stipulates that the following acts of taxpayers are regarded as sales of goods, and value-added tax is levied: First, the goods are delivered to others for consignment; Second, consignment of goods; Third, taxpayers with more than two institutions and unified accounting transfer goods from one institution to other institutions for sale, unless the relevant institutions are located in the same county (city); Fourth, the self-produced or entrusted goods are used for non-taxable items; The fifth is to provide the goods produced, commissioned or purchased as investment to other units or individual operators; Sixth, distribute the self-produced, commissioned or purchased goods to shareholders or investors; The seventh is to use the self-produced entrusted goods for collective welfare or personal consumption; Eighth, give the goods produced, processed or purchased to others free of charge.
Regarding whether the business activities of the institutions that accept the allocation of goods between enterprises with unified accounting (hereinafter referred to as the receiving institutions) belong to the provisions in the third paragraph above, State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China has issued the Notice on the Collection of Value-added Tax on Goods Allocated between Enterprises (Guo Shui Fa [1998] 137), which clearly stipulates that Article 4 of the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Provisional Regulations on Value-added Tax shall be regarded as sales. The second is to collect payment from the buyer. In either case, the consignee shall pay the value-added tax to the local tax authorities; If the above two situations do not occur, the value-added tax shall be paid uniformly by the head office. If the consignee only issues an invoice to the buyer or collects part of the payment, it shall calculate and pay taxes to the head office or branches respectively according to different situations.
With the further development of market economy, various new management modes and modes of operation are constantly emerging. For example, in order to strengthen the fund management of branches and improve the efficiency of fund operation, taxpayers with unified accounting signed agreements with financial institutions where the head office is located, established a fund settlement network, and opened deposit accounts in the name of the head office in all parts of the country (the accounts opened are accounts where branches are located, and only deposits, transfers and withdrawals can be made), and sales realized in various places,
The head office directly issues invoices to the buyer, and the buyer directly deposits the payment into the online bank deposit account of the head office. In this regard, State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China's "Notice on the Taxpayer's Tax Location for Collecting Goods Value-added Tax through the Capital Settlement Network" (Guo [2002] No.802) clarifies how to determine the tax location of this new settlement method: taxpayers open accounts in various places in the name of the head office, collect sales money from buyers in various places through the capital settlement network, and the head office directly issues invoices to buyers. If the collection agency fails to issue an invoice to the buyer or collect money from the buyer according to the Notice of State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China, People's Republic of China (PRC) on the Collection of Value-added Tax on Goods Transferred between Enterprises (Guo Shui Fa [1998] 137), its taxable income shall be subject to value-added tax at the place where its head office is located.
Regarding the tax payment of chain operation, the Notice of the Ministry of Finance of State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China on the Location of VAT Payment for Chain Operation Enterprises (Caishui [1997] No.97) stipulates that for direct chain enterprises operating across regions, that is, all chain stores are wholly owned or controlled by the headquarters and operated under the leadership of the headquarters. According to the requirements of the Opinions of the Ministry of Internal Trade on the Standardization of Chain Store Management (Domestic Trade Law [1997] No.24), the head office and branches can adopt the methods of computer networking, unified accounting, unified and standardized management and operation (hereinafter referred to as "four unifications"), and the head office will make a unified declaration to the local competent tax authorities and obtain the approval of the relevant departments (State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China in conjunction with the Finance Bureau). For voluntary chain enterprises, that is, chain enterprises and franchised chain enterprises whose chain stores are independent legal persons with the same asset ownership, that is, chain stores have signed contracts with the headquarters and obtained the franchise right to use the trademarks, trade names, business technologies and sales commodities developed by the headquarters, and their tax payment locations remain unchanged, independent accounting stores still report and pay VAT to the local competent tax authorities respectively.
The Notice of State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China, Ministry of Finance of People's Republic of China (PRC) on Tax Issues Concerning Chain Enterprises (Caishui [2003] 1No.) stipulates that in order to support the development of chain enterprises, issues related to the unified payment of value-added tax and income tax by chain enterprises are further clarified as follows: 1. Cross-regional unified accounting for chain enterprises operating across provinces and autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the Central Government and cities with separate plans, Where it is necessary for the head office to uniformly declare and pay the value-added tax to the local competent tax authorities, it shall be handled in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Notice of State Taxation Administration of The People's Republic of China, Ministry of Finance of People's Republic of China (PRC) on the Location of Value-added Tax Payment for Chain Enterprises (Caishuizi [1997] No.97). Second, according to the relevant provisions of the Provisional Regulations on Enterprise Income Tax and the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Provisional Regulations on Enterprise Income Tax, the headquarters of direct stores established in the province and across regions shall pay enterprise income tax to the local competent tax authorities in a unified manner, without setting up bank settlement accounts or preparing financial statements and account books. In accordance with the relevant provisions of the Income Tax Law on Foreign Investment and Foreign Enterprises and the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Income Tax Law on Foreign Investment and Foreign Enterprises, foreign-invested enterprises engaged in cross-regional chain operations shall be paid enterprise income tax by the head office to the local competent tax authorities in a unified manner.
To sum up, we should pay attention to two points in the tax treatment of branches that implement unified accounting: first, if branches do not invoice buyers or collect payment from buyers, they can pay taxes in summary; Secondly, if the chain operation mode of "four unifications" is implemented in operation, and financial accounting is not carried out separately, tax payment can be summarized. References:
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