November 28 (SeeNews) - Serbia has significantly reduced the time companies need to comply with tax obligations in the last three years, but has to continue with reforms that will bring technological improvements and further simplify the administration of taxes, the World Bank has said.
On average, compliance with tax obligations takes 19% less time than three years ago, with Serbia performing well, especially compared to its peers in Central and Eastern Europe, the World Bank said in the Paying Taxes 2018 report written in cooperation with PwC.
In 2014 and 2015, Serbia simplified its payroll and social security returns, and introduced e-filing for payroll taxes and social security contributions, VAT and corporate income tax, reducing the number of payments indicator from 67 in 2013 to 33 in 2015 and the time to comply from 279 hours to 226 hours over the same period.
Arguably the most obvious area for improvement is the completion of the process of digitalisation for filing taxes and simplifying local taxes and charges, the World Bank said.
"Further digitalisation of tax compliance processes would, however, require the modernisation of the tax administration at different levels and building capacity not only for e-filing but to improve risk assessment, audit quality and consistency in the implementation of regulation."
Tax regulation in Serbia is continually changing, and not all changes make life easier for taxpayers, the World Bank noted.
"Though the developments are broadly aligned with EU regulation, we still expect to see further changes to address developments in EU legislation and in international trends. We also anticipate changes in tax policy to support certain country strategic priorities."
Overall, Serbia is serious about transforming its tax system and is engaging in reforms across many areas of tax policy and administration. The reforms will take time to implement, but it seems clear, provided focus and commitment are maintained, that Serbia is on the right path to creating a transparent, efficient and taxpayer oriented tax system, according to the report.
Now in its 12th edition, Paying Taxes is a unique report from PwC and the World Bank Group which uses a medium-sized domestic case study company to measure and assess the ease of paying taxes across 190 economies.