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Belgium is interesting. The forms are really complicated, but luckily largely prefilled forms for most (salary and pension income, mortgage related deductions,

by markvdb 10y ago

Belgium is interesting. The forms are really complicated, but luckily largely prefilled forms for most (salary and pension income, mortgage related deductions, ...). Apart from the complexity, the problem here is the extremely slow return of what the government owes you. For 2016 income: * filing between 20170426 - 20170630 * final calculation by post ~20171101 - ~20180401 * return of overpaid amount ~20180101 - ~20180601 The Belgian revenue service almost always overcharges on obligatory prepayments. Refunds happen only at the end of the process. That means an ordinary Belgian citizen gives a free loan to Belgian government for ~12-18 months.

mstade 10y ago
In Sweden you used to earn interest on money in your tax account, but I think the current government removed that this year so now it's a free loan to the government. In some ways, the tax account was a better place to put money than a bank account. There have been periods where the interest on the tax account was competitive compared to banks, so some people would pay a years worth of taxes up front, and come tax season reap the benefits in terms of higher returns. Since they'd already paid all their dues, they'd pay nothing each month and the tax man would just reconcile things monthly as the tax comes due. This isn't as palatable today when there's no interest, but I know some people still do it because it means their take home pay each month is "higher" in the sense that taxes aren't deducted, because they've already been paid. I've considered doing it, since while it makes no difference in the amount I pay, it means I have more cash in hand at the end of each month, rather than having amortize the tax cost over the year. Obviously this only works if you put away that money elsewhere somehow, taxes still have to be paid after all. This also reminds me of a trick a buddy once pulled in the U.K. He paid all his taxes to the wrong account, but it was still in the hands of HMRC. Then when the tax man came knocking, he just showed his payment receipts and HMRC noted the error, fixed it up and apologized for he inconvenience. As well, he'd be paid back interest earned on this money, because the account he paid into had a higher interest than the one he should've paid to, which may have had no interest – I don't quite recall. I don't know if he still does this, but he did it by mistake one year, saw the benefits and figured it wasn't illegal so he just kept doing it. If there's anyone here that knows what I'm talking about I'd love to hear you thoughts!

by markvdb 10y ago

mstade 10y ago

In Sweden you used to earn interest on money in your tax account, but I think the current government removed that this year so now it's a free loan to the government. In some ways, the tax account was a better place to put money than a bank account. There have been periods where the interest on the tax account was competitive compared to banks, so some people would pay a years worth of taxes up front, and come tax season reap the benefits in terms of higher returns. Since they'd already paid all their dues, they'd pay nothing each month and the tax man would just reconcile things monthly as the tax comes due. This isn't as palatable today when there's no interest, but I know some people still do it because it means their take home pay each month is "higher" in the sense that taxes aren't deducted, because they've already been paid. I've considered doing it, since while it makes no difference in the amount I pay, it means I have more cash in hand at the end of each month, rather than having amortize the tax cost over the year. Obviously this only works if you put away that money elsewhere somehow, taxes still have to be paid after all. This also reminds me of a trick a buddy once pulled in the U.K. He paid all his taxes to the wrong account, but it was still in the hands of HMRC. Then when the tax man came knocking, he just showed his payment receipts and HMRC noted the error, fixed it up and apologized for he inconvenience. As well, he'd be paid back interest earned on this money, because the account he paid into had a higher interest than the one he should've paid to, which may have had no interest – I don't quite recall. I don't know if he still does this, but he did it by mistake one year, saw the benefits and figured it wasn't illegal so he just kept doing it. If there's anyone here that knows what I'm talking about I'd love to hear you thoughts!