Mai Son, head of the department, said that the resident of Hanoi’s Cau Giay District earned VND330 billion last year from writing software published on the Google Play and App Store.

In the same year, another young Hanoian had paid over VND18 billion in taxes on her app development income worth VND260 billion.

Aside from these two cases, the municipal Tax Department collected more than VND7 billion worth of income taxes from an individual who was running online businesses on the YouTube and Google platforms.

Overall, the city’s taxman in 2020 collected VND123 billion in income taxes from ecommerce activities on popular online platforms including Google, Facebook and YouTube, up fivefold compared to the 2019 figure. Most of the ecommerce taxpayers were individuals, Son said.

This year, the Tax Department will continue to review, analyze inspection data and examine a number of organizations and individuals that run ecommerce businesses in the capital city. The department, in coordination with commercial banks and trading platforms will collect data and instruct ecommerce operators to fulfil their tax obligations.

The department will also inspect and tackle those who make slow tax payments or intentionally fail to register, declare and pay taxes on their ecommerce businesses. SGT

End of the game nigh for online tax dodgers

The age of unfettered freedom for online business and vendors is coming to a close as Vietnamese authorities are building policies to better trace these activities and collect the state’s due.

Tax evasion questions raised as 55% of FDI enterprises report losses

Numerous FDI enterprises have reported losses over the course of several years, despite continuing to expand production and business activities, along with an annual increase in revenue, thereby causing losses and damage to the state budget.