Lesson 1: Improving the efficiency of services for citizens and businesses
To fulfill the state budget revenue target and simultaneously promote modernization and the provision of electronic tax services to serve citizens and businesses, in 2024 the Nghe An Tax Department focused its leadership and direction on promoting digital transformation. This helped to enhance transparency, prevent fraud and corruption, and create a favorable business environment for citizens and businesses, in line with international trends.
To fulfill the state budget revenue target and simultaneously promote modernization and the provision of electronic tax services to serve citizens and businesses, in 2024 the Nghe An Tax Department focused its leadership and direction on promoting digital transformation. This helped to enhance transparency, prevent fraud and corruption, and create a favorable business environment for citizens and businesses, in line with international trends.
With the motto of putting people and businesses at the center of service, the Nghe An Tax Department has been implementing many projects and tasks applying information technology in tax management and comprehensively transforming digitally. In 2024 alone, the Tax Department issued a Decision to establish a Steering Committee for Digital Transformation, headed by the Director of the Tax Department.
To ensure effective implementation, the Tax Department has developed and issued the 2024 Digital Transformation Plan, which outlines tasks and solutions for implementation, with clear assignments and responsibilities for each department and relevant Tax Sub-department. The unit also implemented the National Digital Transformation Day (October 10, 2024) as planned by the General Department of Taxation and the People's Committee of Nghe An province; regularly conducted training on digital transformation, and organized basic knowledge and skills training courses on digital transformation for officials who are leaders of departments, Tax Sub-departments, and Tax Teams.
Mr. Phan Tuan Nghia, Head of the Information Technology Department of the Nghe An Tax Department, said: "In recent times, the Nghe An Tax Department has been a pioneer in deploying information technology applications to serve the declaration, payment, and refund of taxes for taxpayers, as well as applications serving tax management, ensuring the most favorable conditions for people and businesses, meeting the needs of digitalization and digital transformation of the Finance sector, and aiming towards national digital transformation."
The Department has also focused on promoting digital transformation, such as applying big data and artificial intelligence (AI) to tax and invoice management, contributing to the control and rapid detection of taxpayers engaging in invoice fraud. Simultaneously, it has implemented the development of digital maps for business households and mineral mines in the province; and strengthened tax management for e-commerce and business activities on digital platforms.
Electronic tax services have consistently maintained a rate of over 99% of taxpayers filing and paying taxes electronically, and 100% of tax refund applications are submitted electronically; 100% of businesses and household businesses paying taxes using the declaration method have adopted electronic invoices in their buying, selling, and service provision.
In addition, the effective implementation of electronic invoices generated from cash registers has resulted in the total number of taxpayers who have registered exceeding the number of taxpayers registered for implementation according to Official Letter No. 1432/TCT-DNNCN dated April 20, 2023, from the General Department of Taxation; 100% of taxpayers engaged in the gasoline and oil business have implemented electronic invoices in accordance with the plan of the General Department of Taxation.
The tax sector continues to maintain the deployment of the eTax Mobile application on mobile devices throughout the province. 100% of civil servants, public employees, and workers in state agencies; 100% of business households paying taxes using the declaration method; and 70% of business households paying lump-sum taxes have installed eTax Mobile to support taxpayers in looking up tax obligations, paying taxes, notifications, documents, checking vehicle registration fee rates, looking up taxpayer information, business household information, dependents, tax settlement, and tax office addresses, thus facilitating the fulfillment of their obligations to the state budget.
The Nghe An Provincial Tax Department has implemented a review and standardization of individual tax identification numbers in accordance with Official Letter No. 846/TCT-DNNCN dated March 21, 2023, from the General Department of Taxation regarding the review and standardization of individual tax identification number data. The Nghe An Provincial Tax Department consistently ranks among the top 10 tax departments nationwide with the highest number of correctly matched review data. The Department has also successfully collaborated with the Nghe An Provincial Public Service Portal to implement the payment of land-related financial obligations for businesses through the National Public Service Portal, as directed by the Prime Minister.
Implement and effectively utilize the electronic land information exchange application between the Tax Authority and the Land Registration Office branches in Vinh City and the districts and towns within the province.
Since April 2023, all 21 districts, towns, and Vinh City have had their land registration information transferred electronically to determine financial obligations. This has significantly boosted administrative procedure reform, maximizing convenience for citizens when carrying out land-related administrative procedures.
In addition, the sector is implementing cashless payment of non-agricultural land use tax through bank accounts of commune, ward, and town People's Committees, meeting the digital transformation requirements of the Ministry of Finance, the General Department of Taxation, and Plan No. 216/KH-UBND dated March 31, 2022, of the People's Committee of Nghe An province on the implementation of the Project on developing cashless payments in Nghe An province for the period 2021-2025.
As a result, since its implementation across the province in August 2024, 100% of the People's Committees of cities, districts, and towns in the province have issued directives to the People's Committees of communes, wards, and townships to open authorized collection accounts at BIDV to collect non-agricultural land use tax using cashless methods. By October 15, 2024, 9 out of 10 tax offices had implemented non-cash collection of non-agricultural land use tax. Notably, in Vinh City, 55,144 taxpayers have paid over 17,360,000,000 VND in non-agricultural land use tax in 2024 using this method.
The Tax Department is also continuously strengthening the management of electronic invoices based on risk analysis results. The risk management application for the invoice management subsystem supports risk analysis according to the set of evaluation criteria and indicators, identifying taxpayers with signs of risk in invoice management and use as stipulated in Decision No. 78/2023/QD-TCT dated February 2, 2023. The application automatically evaluates and scores on the 25th of each month, thereby determining high, medium, and low risk levels. The result of the evaluation is a list of taxpayers with signs of risk to be included in inspection lists, audits, or notifications to change the invoice usage method.
Furthermore, based on the actual situation and management requirements of the Tax Department, under the direct guidance of the Director, the staff of the IT Department have developed and implemented a risk monitoring tool to proactively prevent risks by establishing risk criteria for regular taxpayer management and conducting initial risk assessments for businesses registering to use electronic invoices; at the same time, strengthening the responsibility of units and individuals in taxpayer management.
In Prime Minister's Directive No. 1284 dated December 1, 2023, on strengthening the management and use of electronic invoices for gasoline and oil retail business activities, the Prime Minister requested Ministers; Heads of ministerial-level agencies, government agencies, and Chairpersons of People's Committees of provinces and centrally-administered cities to: Complete the information technology system for electronic invoices, ensuring the smooth and convenient reception and connection of electronic invoice information by tax authorities, contributing to improving the efficiency of tax management; to be completed no later than the first quarter of 2024.
Following the Prime Minister's directive, by the end of March 2024, 100% of gas stations in Nghe An province had completed the issuance of electronic invoices as required by the Prime Minister.
According to Mr. Nguyen Xuan Hue, Head of the Phu Quy I Regional Tax Office, which manages 78 gas stations in Quy Hop, Quy Chau, and Que Phong districts: Following the direction of the Nghe An Provincial Tax Department, the unit has coordinated with the districts to establish inter-agency inspection teams to implement electronic invoices for each sale of gasoline and diesel. Along with this, they have strengthened the management, inspection, and supervision of retail gasoline and diesel business activities, checking the issuance of electronic invoices for each sale, and connecting with the tax authorities.
The Vinh City Tax Department manages 26 businesses selling gasoline and diesel fuel, with 145 gas stations. A representative from the Vinh City Tax Department stated that 100% of gas stations in Vinh City have been issuing electronic invoices after each sale since March 20th.
Following a request from the General Department of Taxation, the Nghe An Provincial Tax Department has updated the progress of issuing electronic invoices for each gasoline sale at gas stations throughout the province. By March 31, 2024, all gas stations had completed the investment in equipment for issuing electronic invoices for each sale; the departments of the Provincial Tax Department and all tax branches in the province issued invoices for each sale, covering a total of 1,622 gas stations across 527 locations.
In implementing the National Digital Transformation Program until 2025, with a vision to 2030 approved by the Government, which identifies digital transformation as not only a tool but also an adaptive solution for effective management, integrating it into many areas of tax management, creating synchronization in storage, input, management, control, and operation, the Nghe An Tax Department has consistently strived to reform and modernize its management work, researching and applying many advanced and useful software, from perfecting the legal environment to developing technological infrastructure.
In addition, efforts have been intensified to educate taxpayers on how to implement and combat malware. The Nghe An Tax Department has successfully implemented the modernization strategy of higher authorities, providing electronic services and support tools for citizens and businesses, thereby contributing to improved budget revenue collection efficiency.
