The Indonesian tax office (ITO) has issued Circular No. SE-9/PJ/2023 regarding the Resolution of Follow-up on Concrete Data. The circular became effective on August 4 2023.
Concrete data includes tax invoices, withholding tax or income tax collection evidence, and transaction records. Concrete data that considered results in the underpayment or non-payment of taxes will be followed up with further examination of the concrete data. For this purpose, a prioritisation list has been prepared by the ITO.
In general, in the event that the result of the examination indicates non-compliance by the taxpayer, for concrete data that will expire after 90 days, the ITO will issue a letter of request for explanation of the data and/or information (a Surat Permintaan Penjelasan atas Data dan/atau Keterangan, or SP2DK).
For concrete data that will expire in 90 days or less, the ITO will issue a tax audit instruction letter.
The government regulates customs re-examination
The Ministry of Finance (MoF) has issued a new regulation, No. 78/2023 (MoF-78/2023), regarding re-examination in the customs field. The regulation will come into effect on October 20 2023.
MoF-78/2023 sets forth more detailed provisions concerning the scope and procedures for re-examination in the customs field, as previously stipulated in Law No. 17 of 2006.
While Law No. 17 of 2006 only regulated that re-examination can be carried out on import notifications that affect the import duty rates of imported goods, MoF-78/2023 extends its coverage to import and/or export notifications that result in changes to import and/or export duties.
The scope of MoF-78/2023 stipulates that re-examination shall be conducted on import and export customs declarations that have reached more than 30 days since the registration date:
Imports – re-examination is conducted on import customs declarations on the rate and/or customs value. Re-examination is conducted within two years from the date of import customs declaration registration.
Exports – re-examination of export customs declarations is conducted on export duty rates, export prices, types of export goods, and/or quantities of export goods. Re-examination is conducted within two years from the date of export customs declaration registration.
The goods owner or importer is obligated to provide a written explanation and samples of the goods in response to a request for data and/or documents issued by the Directorate General of Customs and Excise (DGCE) no later than seven days from the date of the request for data and/or documents. The submission of written data can be done directly, through courier services, electronic media, or a computerised service system.
Failure to provide the required written explanation will be considered as not submitting any data. As a result, the DGCE will issue an SP 1 (a first warning letter), then, if necessary, an SP 2 (a second warning letter), and ultimately block customs access.
Procedures for issuing tax assessment notices and tax collection notices
On August 22 2023, the MoF issued a new regulation, No. 80/2023 (MoF-80/2023) regarding the procedures for issuing tax assessment notices (SKP) and tax collection notices (STP). MoF-80/2023 came into force on the date of its promulgation, August 24 2023.
The enactment of MoF-80/2023 revokes previous regulations; i.e., MoF-145/2012, which regulates the procedures for issuing SKP and STP; and MoF-255/2014, certain articles in MoF-256/2014, and MoF-78/2016, which regulate SKP and STP for land and building tax.
The most salient points taken from MoF-80/2023 are as follows:
MoF-80/2023 consolidates the provisions for the issuance of SKP and STP, as well as STP for land and building tax, which were previously governed by separate regulations.
From the time of promulgation of this regulation, the delivery of SKP and STP to taxpayers can be done electronically upon availability of the system.
Through this regulation, the government can issue SKP for:
Underpayment in stamp duty collection;
Carbon tax collectors that have failed to collect and/or remit carbon taxes properly; and
Taxpayers engaged in activities that generate carbon emissions that have not paid or underpaid carbon taxes.
For taxpayers that have obtained approval to use US dollars, SKP and STP (with an exception for an administrative penalty) are issued using US dollars.
