9 ms·

Just for comparison: in Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform* Java desktop app for filing your taxes. The UI isn't grea

by gjvnq 7y ago

Just for comparison: in Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform* Java desktop app for filing your taxes. The UI isn't great* and if you do complex stock trading it can be a pain to add the necessary information, but for the vast majority of people it works just fine. It also shows if it is better to use the standard deduction or the itemized deductions for your particular case and also calculates your effective tax rate. In fact, the Java App has for years been the only way to file personal income federal* tax. The paper forms were abolished because (almost) no one used them and they had a large rate of mistakes. * The Java desktop app runs on Linux, macOS and Windows. (And possibly others) * There is a separate mobile app but I haven't actually used it. * In macOS there was bug in last year's version: it used ctrl instead of command for things like copy and paste. * There is no state income tax in Brazil.

lqet 7y ago
Fun fact: the official tax filing application in Germany which has been around for a few decades is called "ELSTER" (apronym for Elektronische Steuererklärung, "Electronic Tax Return") which literally translates to "MAGPIE", as in "thieving magpie" ("Diebische Elster"). This is a form of self-irony which is quite unusual for the German tax offices. OS portability has greatly improved with their online app [0], which is actually very good and easy to use. Before, the only stable way to run their Desktop application on Linux was through wine. [0] https://www.elster.de/eportal/login https://www.elster.de/eportal/login
- Anarch157a 7y ago
  Here in Brazil the mascot of the Income Tax is a Lion, it's of an old ad campaign the government ran, comparing taxes with lions and saying "the lion is tame".
  - marcosdumay 7y ago
    It's because of an old popular joke in that the government is a lion that will always take a lion-sized bite from your income. It's really an old joke. On any reference I have ever found, no matter how old, the joke is already old and the readership is expected to know it.
    - exikyut 7y ago
      Oh of _course_, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion's_share http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion's_share Which is obviously intentionally ironic considering that > The lion's share is an idiomatic expression which refers to the major share of something. I wonder what other countries tuck these kinds of harmlessly blatant humor in similarly unexpected places. It's nice.
- MrGilbert 7y ago
  ELSTER is one of the few examples that come into my mind in terms of "software done right": It's stable and "just works", at least for me. It's first version was released to the public in 1999, so... Yes, ELSTER is around for almost 20 years now, getting constantly refined at least in the front-end. All in all, it's something you wouldn't have expected here in Germany in terms of software projects from the government.
  - lqet 7y ago
    AFAIK, it is mostly developed in-house, at least the original version was developed by the Bavarian tax office. In my experience, if government software (for schools, tax offices, political participation, etc.) is developed by an external company, the primary objective of the company often quickly transforms from "creating usable software for all citizens" to "drain the most amount of money out of the infinite resources of the federal government".
    - lars_francke 7y ago
      It still is developed there but they have external consultants helping them.
  - Angostura 7y ago
    I have to say that the UK's HMRC web-based self-assessment site has always struck me as being a really good example of tax returns done right. It presents as the equivalent of the paper form but with many of the fields autocalculating for you, and offering contextual help. Quite nifty.
    - codeulike 7y ago
      Yeah its pretty good when you consider the complexity it has to cover.
- FPGAhacker 7y ago
  > This is a form of self-irony which is quite unusual for the German tax offices. Love it.
- kzrdude 7y ago
  The danish tax authority is called skat. It has a double meaning of taxes and loved one, it's as if the German one was called Schatz/Schätzle, I think it's cute.
  - moron4hire 7y ago
    In English, the word "skat" is used to refer to animal droppings.
    - abruzzi 7y ago
      technically it is spelled "scat"
  - kmonsen 7y ago
    Isn't skat more like treasure that's also used for people? At least that's how it is in Norwegian. No idea why taxes use the same word, it sure so in Norwegian too.
    - sobani 7y ago
      In Holland we have the word schat which also means treasure (and loved one). As an extension of schat we also have schatkist, which means treasure chest, which is also used as the translation for treasury. When I look up the meaning of schat the dictionary says: A large collection of valuables. I see how an organization gets named after the very thing they are supposed to handle.
      - kzrdude 7y ago
        skat/skatt is common to danish/norwegian/swedish, and in all countries it means both taxes and treasure. In danish/norwegian it also means loved one, but swedes would miss that point. The danes have chosen to name their tax authority not "skat authority" or something like that, just "skat" which evokes the friendly/funny pun.
- robert_foss 7y ago
  Having moved from Sweden to Germany I appreciate Elster existing (and not being solely paper based unlike the other many many German beaurocratic exercises one has to Wade through). However it misses the most important part. In Sweden your tax declaration comes pre-populated with data they already have, like salary/pension/savings/stock sales/etc., and you can either just accept it as it is or make changes to the already existing data. It's so easy that you in fact just can send an SMS (that is verified to be from you) to the taxation agency saying that their suggestion is right.
  - levosmetalo 7y ago
    In Germany, it's actually similar. You can opt in to include the data submitted for you by various sources and include them in your tax declaration. The only drawback is you need to select each one (salary, basic info, church tax info) to import it into your declaration, and that you need to wait until end of February since that's the deadline for third parties to submit your data. Also, some things, like capital gains, you don't even need to declare if you used only German brokers, since they are legally required to submit it for you.
    - fsw 7y ago
      It's called "Vorausgefüllte Steuererklärung" (see https://www.elster.de/eportal/infoseite/belegabruf_%28privatpersonen%29 https://www.elster.de/eportal/infoseite/belegabruf_%28privat...).
  - germanier 7y ago
    It takes many clicks and requires to wait for a letter once but Elster offers that too (under the term "Belegabruf"). It then prepopulates the tax return with the data they have.
  - tapland 7y ago
    Banks send you letter the weeks before with capital gains, interest payments and employers send you letters with totals of taxes paid. They note if anything needs to be done manually. The total time spend combined for me filing taxes for the last 10 years is less than 15 minutes. And the reason it isn't less than 3 is because I've logged in (using biometrics and password on my phone that is a hardware token to my bank wich is used for instant secure identification) to check that everything looks OK and to add the commuting at least 10 km/day on bike deduction.
iagovar 7y ago
Similar case in Spain.
jib 7y ago
In Sweden, the government does the work for most normal cases. They send you a suggestion of “this is all we know about” and you just say “yeah, seems right” via SMS. In Ireland you don’t do anything in the usual case, unless you think it’s wrong, everything is taxed at source by the employers/banks. Both cases different if you’re a company ofc.
- giovannibonetti 7y ago
  It seems a bit naive of the government to reveal to you your income sources they know about. If you have any hidden ones you can confidently not report them and pay less taxes than you would otherwise.
  - spejs 7y ago
    Not really. Everyone is aware of what is automatically reported to the tax authorities.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    I assume this would still be a crime, and you'd be held responsible for lying on the past forms in discovered. The only difference is, this is optimized for making the common case easier - the case of typical income of regular, honest individuals.
  - kristiandupont 7y ago
    It's the same in Denmark and it feels right to me. It's not like they are doing detective work (per default). If you have a concealed source of income, I'd expect them not to know about it. Of course, you'd still be breaking the law by not reporting it and it could turn up if they notice something that doesn't add up somewhere.
  - samsari 7y ago
    Until you're selected for a random audit and quickly get charged with tax fraud.
    - 7y ago
cesarb 7y ago
> Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform Java desktop app for filing your taxes. Other fun stuff about that desktop app... * Originally, it was a DOS-only program (yes, it's that old). Then for a while, it was Windows-only, then for some time (probably due to the Linux users complaining) there was both the Windows-only version and the Java multi-platform version, and later the Windows-only version was discontinued. * The original way of sending the output of this program to Receita Federal was to write it to a floppy disk and take it to a bank, which would read and upload it. Later functionality was added to send it through the Internet instead, and some time later the floppy disk option was removed.
- bregma 7y ago
  > probably due to the Linux users complaining For a while a lot of non-aligned countries were mandating the exclusive use of open-source software by government agencies, because the idea of their government being beholden to a US corporation was anathema. I suspect this was the motivation behind eliminating the Microsoft-only government service. I haven't heard much about that open-source requirement lately. I suspect the Long Reach has been making quiet moves behind the scenes, and the ascendancy of neofascist regimes in many of those countries will do what fascist regimes always do (ie. cater to the cartel making up the fasces).
- mmsimanga 7y ago
  > The original way of sending the output of this program to Receita Federal was to write it to a floppy disk and take it to a bank My cousin started work as a company messenger back in the early 80s and these are the sort of tasks he used to do. Its amazing that the profession has died out in in such relatively short space of time. I guess courier companies have filled in the slot but courier companies would never have coped with the number of documents that needed to be ferried about town in the old days.
- consp 7y ago
  Short recap from somewhere else: In the Netherlands we had (for a very short while at least as far as I remember) a DOS program as well on diskette. I never used it but my dad did when internet explorer was not yet evil and msn was a network. You could send it in via modem (9k6 baud yay!) and it would work ... sometimes or hand it in via the diskette. Once the internet got going you could send it more easily as you could send the created files directly instead of relying on the modem dial-in via dos. For myself I never filed on paper (2002 first one). After the introduction of windows programs they ported it to linux the next year (filed the first one on windows only on a library pc, program might have existed earlier) and have now switched to web based. If you had a company which did their taxes on time everything was (and is) filled out mostly correct. You check it and sign off. As a student it took a while to fill in all the deductibles but if you just have to pay you are done in minutes. Is/was it perfect? Far from. Does it work for most people? Yes.
Nursie 7y ago
In Australia a sort of spreadsheet-like app is published each year. It pulls in data from a variety of sources (banks and employers mostly, IIRC), fills in everything it can and then lets you do the rest. Windows only last time I did it (7 years ago?), things may have improved further since then.
- stonith 7y ago
  It's online via mygov these days. took a couple of steps back initially since it was missing functionality but I think it's mostly there now.
  - crummy 7y ago
    I moved to Australia last year and was shocked that it took me less than two minutes to file taxes. What a dream.
- LilBytes 7y ago
  All Web based now, no thick client. It still pools in all of your data from various sources as the old e tax client did. It was only Windows too from what I recall. It's all been centralised in myGov for a few years.
Illniyar 7y ago
In Israel employee taxes are calculated and paid by the employer. Only self-employed, people with side-jobs or people who make over a certain threshold need to file their taxes manually (and in that case things are a bit complicated). Healthcare, pensions and benefits are paid as part of the paycheck if you are employed (they are universal and mandatory, so not the same as in the U.S.), there are no other deductibles that a regular person can claim.
trauco 7y ago
Same in Chile. If you have a regular, salaried job, your employer reports your earnings and all income taxes that have been paid, your bank reports your interest income, etc. It takes less than 5 minutes to do your taxes unless you have unusual sources of income.
xtracto 7y ago
Adding a data point with Mexico: All invoices are digital. Every person who gets a TaxId also gets a Private/Public keypair and generating invoices means signing the document with that key. The amazing thing is that now accountants talk about the XML, which is the legal representation of the invoice. As a result, every year if you file your taxes, you go I to the government freely provided website , get into your account and most of the data is there for the exercise, including deducted money that you can get back. If you are a standard worker earning less than certain amount (very sensible, so the vast majority of workers fall in there) you don't even have to file your taxes. That's one thing that is good about this country.
- mmsimanga 7y ago
  What you have just said has thrown me into a tizz trying to understand what you have said. Could you please give a bit more practical details. Say I want to claim rent/transport/medical expenses. Will doctors, car rental place and landlords all issue me an electronic receipt?
  - PeterisP 7y ago
    Not from Mexico, so it might be different for them, but one way how this works in some places is that the tax office gets all the electronic receipts from all the cash register/POS systems anyway, since that's how they monitor sales/vat/excise/etc taxes paid by the merchant and reduce the risks of "under the counter" sales where fake receipts are issued but taxes not paid on the sale. So if the doctor's office punches in my legal ID number with the receipt (or if the ID gets added automatically from the billing system that a large hospital would have), then when the office sends all their receipt files to the tax office, the tax office will automatically add that electronic receipt to my tax deduction.
  - xtracto 7y ago
    Yes. Not all spending can be deducted. But for the ones you do, you have the right to ask for the "electronic invoice" and the business has to give it to you. When that happens they ask you for your TAX ID and then the business generates the invoice and your taxid and their taxid makes the tie. The Mexican IRS systems see all of this. So at the tax reporting moment, the system will have all that info. It is pretty neat actually. However I think it is possible bc in Mexico people are not that concerned with privacy and all that.
liziwizi 7y ago
I also want to brag about Tax-On-Web for Belgium. Development started over 15 years ago, it's been steadily improving over the years, it even works for linux users, it already fills in all tax details they already know (like wages) I love it!
Cthulhu_ 7y ago
Similar in NL; it used to be a desktop app (which IIRC was even distributed via diskettes or a CD-ROM but later just a download), nowadays it's a webapp. Also prefills most information from employers (who already pay your income tax for you every month), mortgages, banks, etc. The only complexity for me came when I bought my house (some costs are deductible) and when I had to report Bitcoin held at Coinbase (and for that I had to report the (EUR) on January 1st 2018 specifically).
52-6F-62 7y ago
Canada doesn't release its own software, but it certifies a selection of free and paid software of varying complexity. I'd like it if we could take up other, simpler models of sorting out income tax but I use software out of this pool† every year and its served me just fine: https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/e-services/e-services-individuals/netfile-overview/certified-software-netfile-program.html https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/e-services/... † usually StudioTax. I donated to them last year. It's not pretty software but it's effective and easy to use. https://www.studiotax.com/en/ https://www.studiotax.com/en/ "Our business model is similar to that of a street performer. You can use and enjoy our software and later decide if the experience was worth it and you can afford a donation. However, based on many users’ feedback, you should be wary of recent free offerings from big commercial organizations. To use our previous analogy, they are big circuses that send their clowns out to the street to attract unsuspecting customers to their tents and pressure them in paying for their overpriced shows."
- finphil 7y ago
  I concur. Studio Tax is not pretty but it gets the job done for most people.
- morbm 7y ago
  I used SimpleTax for the first time this year and it's a lot more intuitive than StudioTax which I used in the past. It may not be ideal for every situation, but it was much simpler for me.
cascom 7y ago
I was under the impression - perhaps falsely - that taxes in Brazil were nightmarishly complex?
- rvr_ 7y ago
  Its simple if your are an employee and complex if you are an employer. For the self employed there is a super simple filling up to a certain threshold. Companies also have additional requirements based on revenue brackets, number of employees and type of economic activities they do. Anything sligth complex eill require multiple agencies fees and byzanthine laws.
- ratww 7y ago
  There's a lot of players involved. IMO for regular people it's simple/cheap, but for companies/employers it's complex/expensive Federal government charges taxes on income, production, import/export and over bank operations; states charge consumption and vehicle taxes; cities charge service and property taxes. Then there's also contributions that employers pay for workers, and some that workers pay. However, consumption tax can compound itself (because of sales between distributors, or taxes over raw materials), so there's a "substitution" formula which can get pretty weird (but companies take care of it).
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Al-Khwarizmi 7y ago
In Spain it used to be a Java desktop app as well, the last incarnation of a software that started as a DOS program distributed in diskettes back in 1988. Now it's no longer a standalone program, but a website (not sure which technology, but it runs in current browsers without requiring Java installed, AFAIR). The government makes a draft declaration for you, if it's OK you just have to digitally sign your agreement and provide a bank account to pay or receive your return (if you haven't already done that in the past). Otherwise you need to edit it adding whatever they've missed, but this is only needed if you do complex stock trading, operate with money abroad, etc. For most people it's just skimming through it in case there is an obvious error, and confirming the draft. Once you confirm the draft, it takes only around 2-4 days for the tax return money to appear in your bank account. The website's UI is good. Spanish e-administration webapps are a bit hit-and-miss, some are dreadful (digital certificate request, I'm looking at you), but that particular one is fine and has always worked well for me.
- benhurmarcel 7y ago
  Same in France, it's a simple website. You receive a notification email, connect with a simple login and password, check that the pre-filled form is correct, and validate.
codeulike 7y ago
UK provides a web form. Pretty well done one considering the complexity. I think you can use your own software too if you like and theres some sort of submission api. The only out-of-date thing I've noticed on the UK one is stuff like 'this PDF of your tax return is 1.5mb, on a dial up modem this might take 5 mins to download' etc. And I guess some people might still be on that kind of link so fair enough edit: And yeah in the UK you dont have to file at all if your situation is simple (e.g. you just have one job and one source of income).
- sleepykoala 7y ago
  It's probably worth noting that most people in the UK don't have to file at all (if you're on a wage and not in the top tax band, it's all automatic in your paycheck), and if you have a dispute/complication you just write a simple letter to the tax office laying out your case.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
cjslep 7y ago
As an American living in Kanton Zürich, I used both (paid) TurboTax and (free) Privat Tax (straight from the cantonal government). Swiss one was way easier to understand by far. As a side effect of doing those taxes, it was easy to see my actual wealth and my actual net income for the year. Which in America is a sin.
evsasse 7y ago
I've used the mobile app on Android, it wasn't a joy (it still lacks some polishing), but it was certainly VERY straightforward. Personally I don't have lots of stuff to file, but I did everything under 1 hour, while still discovering how to use the app and learning a bunch of taxes nomenclature.
amq 7y ago
In Ukraine there is a government webapp where you can fill all possible tax forms, and they come mostly pre-filled. The only small hurdle is getting the private/public key, it's fast, but only happens upon request or if you have a bank account at supported banks. If you were only on a payroll, you don't need to declare anything at all, it happens automatically.
Reedx 7y ago
There are proposals in the US to do this. I think the best I've seen so far is Andrew Yang's plan: https://www.yang2020.com/policies/making-taxes-fun/ https://www.yang2020.com/policies/making-taxes-fun/ Opt in to have your taxes automatically done. National celebration of projects completed. Ability to specify where 1% of your taxes go. So not only make it easy to do, but try to make it fun and shift the mindset from burden to societal contribution.

by gjvnq 7y ago

lqet 7y ago

Fun fact: the official tax filing application in Germany which has been around for a few decades is called "ELSTER" (apronym for Elektronische Steuererklärung, "Electronic Tax Return") which literally translates to "MAGPIE", as in "thieving magpie" ("Diebische Elster"). This is a form of self-irony which is quite unusual for the German tax offices. OS portability has greatly improved with their online app [0], which is actually very good and easy to use. Before, the only stable way to run their Desktop application on Linux was through wine. [0] https://www.elster.de/eportal/login https://www.elster.de/eportal/login

Anarch157a 7y ago
Here in Brazil the mascot of the Income Tax is a Lion, it's of an old ad campaign the government ran, comparing taxes with lions and saying "the lion is tame".
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  It's because of an old popular joke in that the government is a lion that will always take a lion-sized bite from your income. It's really an old joke. On any reference I have ever found, no matter how old, the joke is already old and the readership is expected to know it.
  - exikyut 7y ago
    Oh of _course_, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion's_share http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion's_share Which is obviously intentionally ironic considering that > The lion's share is an idiomatic expression which refers to the major share of something. I wonder what other countries tuck these kinds of harmlessly blatant humor in similarly unexpected places. It's nice.
MrGilbert 7y ago
ELSTER is one of the few examples that come into my mind in terms of "software done right": It's stable and "just works", at least for me. It's first version was released to the public in 1999, so... Yes, ELSTER is around for almost 20 years now, getting constantly refined at least in the front-end. All in all, it's something you wouldn't have expected here in Germany in terms of software projects from the government.
- lqet 7y ago
  AFAIK, it is mostly developed in-house, at least the original version was developed by the Bavarian tax office. In my experience, if government software (for schools, tax offices, political participation, etc.) is developed by an external company, the primary objective of the company often quickly transforms from "creating usable software for all citizens" to "drain the most amount of money out of the infinite resources of the federal government".
  - lars_francke 7y ago
    It still is developed there but they have external consultants helping them.
- Angostura 7y ago
  I have to say that the UK's HMRC web-based self-assessment site has always struck me as being a really good example of tax returns done right. It presents as the equivalent of the paper form but with many of the fields autocalculating for you, and offering contextual help. Quite nifty.
  - codeulike 7y ago
    Yeah its pretty good when you consider the complexity it has to cover.
FPGAhacker 7y ago
> This is a form of self-irony which is quite unusual for the German tax offices. Love it.
kzrdude 7y ago
The danish tax authority is called skat. It has a double meaning of taxes and loved one, it's as if the German one was called Schatz/Schätzle, I think it's cute.
- moron4hire 7y ago
  In English, the word "skat" is used to refer to animal droppings.
  - abruzzi 7y ago
    technically it is spelled "scat"
- kmonsen 7y ago
  Isn't skat more like treasure that's also used for people? At least that's how it is in Norwegian. No idea why taxes use the same word, it sure so in Norwegian too.
  - sobani 7y ago
    In Holland we have the word schat which also means treasure (and loved one). As an extension of schat we also have schatkist, which means treasure chest, which is also used as the translation for treasury. When I look up the meaning of schat the dictionary says: A large collection of valuables. I see how an organization gets named after the very thing they are supposed to handle.
    - kzrdude 7y ago
      skat/skatt is common to danish/norwegian/swedish, and in all countries it means both taxes and treasure. In danish/norwegian it also means loved one, but swedes would miss that point. The danes have chosen to name their tax authority not "skat authority" or something like that, just "skat" which evokes the friendly/funny pun.
robert_foss 7y ago
Having moved from Sweden to Germany I appreciate Elster existing (and not being solely paper based unlike the other many many German beaurocratic exercises one has to Wade through). However it misses the most important part. In Sweden your tax declaration comes pre-populated with data they already have, like salary/pension/savings/stock sales/etc., and you can either just accept it as it is or make changes to the already existing data. It's so easy that you in fact just can send an SMS (that is verified to be from you) to the taxation agency saying that their suggestion is right.
- levosmetalo 7y ago
  In Germany, it's actually similar. You can opt in to include the data submitted for you by various sources and include them in your tax declaration. The only drawback is you need to select each one (salary, basic info, church tax info) to import it into your declaration, and that you need to wait until end of February since that's the deadline for third parties to submit your data. Also, some things, like capital gains, you don't even need to declare if you used only German brokers, since they are legally required to submit it for you.
  - fsw 7y ago
    It's called "Vorausgefüllte Steuererklärung" (see https://www.elster.de/eportal/infoseite/belegabruf_%28privatpersonen%29 https://www.elster.de/eportal/infoseite/belegabruf_%28privat...).
- germanier 7y ago
  It takes many clicks and requires to wait for a letter once but Elster offers that too (under the term "Belegabruf"). It then prepopulates the tax return with the data they have.
- tapland 7y ago
  Banks send you letter the weeks before with capital gains, interest payments and employers send you letters with totals of taxes paid. They note if anything needs to be done manually. The total time spend combined for me filing taxes for the last 10 years is less than 15 minutes. And the reason it isn't less than 3 is because I've logged in (using biometrics and password on my phone that is a hardware token to my bank wich is used for instant secure identification) to check that everything looks OK and to add the commuting at least 10 km/day on bike deduction.

iagovar 7y ago

Similar case in Spain.

jib 7y ago

In Sweden, the government does the work for most normal cases. They send you a suggestion of “this is all we know about” and you just say “yeah, seems right” via SMS. In Ireland you don’t do anything in the usual case, unless you think it’s wrong, everything is taxed at source by the employers/banks. Both cases different if you’re a company ofc.

giovannibonetti 7y ago
It seems a bit naive of the government to reveal to you your income sources they know about. If you have any hidden ones you can confidently not report them and pay less taxes than you would otherwise.
- spejs 7y ago
  Not really. Everyone is aware of what is automatically reported to the tax authorities.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  I assume this would still be a crime, and you'd be held responsible for lying on the past forms in discovered. The only difference is, this is optimized for making the common case easier - the case of typical income of regular, honest individuals.
- kristiandupont 7y ago
  It's the same in Denmark and it feels right to me. It's not like they are doing detective work (per default). If you have a concealed source of income, I'd expect them not to know about it. Of course, you'd still be breaking the law by not reporting it and it could turn up if they notice something that doesn't add up somewhere.
- samsari 7y ago
  Until you're selected for a random audit and quickly get charged with tax fraud.
  - 7y ago

cesarb 7y ago

> Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform Java desktop app for filing your taxes. Other fun stuff about that desktop app... * Originally, it was a DOS-only program (yes, it's that old). Then for a while, it was Windows-only, then for some time (probably due to the Linux users complaining) there was both the Windows-only version and the Java multi-platform version, and later the Windows-only version was discontinued. * The original way of sending the output of this program to Receita Federal was to write it to a floppy disk and take it to a bank, which would read and upload it. Later functionality was added to send it through the Internet instead, and some time later the floppy disk option was removed.

bregma 7y ago
> probably due to the Linux users complaining For a while a lot of non-aligned countries were mandating the exclusive use of open-source software by government agencies, because the idea of their government being beholden to a US corporation was anathema. I suspect this was the motivation behind eliminating the Microsoft-only government service. I haven't heard much about that open-source requirement lately. I suspect the Long Reach has been making quiet moves behind the scenes, and the ascendancy of neofascist regimes in many of those countries will do what fascist regimes always do (ie. cater to the cartel making up the fasces).
mmsimanga 7y ago
> The original way of sending the output of this program to Receita Federal was to write it to a floppy disk and take it to a bank My cousin started work as a company messenger back in the early 80s and these are the sort of tasks he used to do. Its amazing that the profession has died out in in such relatively short space of time. I guess courier companies have filled in the slot but courier companies would never have coped with the number of documents that needed to be ferried about town in the old days.
consp 7y ago
Short recap from somewhere else: In the Netherlands we had (for a very short while at least as far as I remember) a DOS program as well on diskette. I never used it but my dad did when internet explorer was not yet evil and msn was a network. You could send it in via modem (9k6 baud yay!) and it would work ... sometimes or hand it in via the diskette. Once the internet got going you could send it more easily as you could send the created files directly instead of relying on the modem dial-in via dos. For myself I never filed on paper (2002 first one). After the introduction of windows programs they ported it to linux the next year (filed the first one on windows only on a library pc, program might have existed earlier) and have now switched to web based. If you had a company which did their taxes on time everything was (and is) filled out mostly correct. You check it and sign off. As a student it took a while to fill in all the deductibles but if you just have to pay you are done in minutes. Is/was it perfect? Far from. Does it work for most people? Yes.

Nursie 7y ago

In Australia a sort of spreadsheet-like app is published each year. It pulls in data from a variety of sources (banks and employers mostly, IIRC), fills in everything it can and then lets you do the rest. Windows only last time I did it (7 years ago?), things may have improved further since then.

stonith 7y ago
It's online via mygov these days. took a couple of steps back initially since it was missing functionality but I think it's mostly there now.
- crummy 7y ago
  I moved to Australia last year and was shocked that it took me less than two minutes to file taxes. What a dream.
LilBytes 7y ago
All Web based now, no thick client. It still pools in all of your data from various sources as the old e tax client did. It was only Windows too from what I recall. It's all been centralised in myGov for a few years.

Illniyar 7y ago

In Israel employee taxes are calculated and paid by the employer. Only self-employed, people with side-jobs or people who make over a certain threshold need to file their taxes manually (and in that case things are a bit complicated). Healthcare, pensions and benefits are paid as part of the paycheck if you are employed (they are universal and mandatory, so not the same as in the U.S.), there are no other deductibles that a regular person can claim.

trauco 7y ago

Same in Chile. If you have a regular, salaried job, your employer reports your earnings and all income taxes that have been paid, your bank reports your interest income, etc. It takes less than 5 minutes to do your taxes unless you have unusual sources of income.

xtracto 7y ago

Adding a data point with Mexico: All invoices are digital. Every person who gets a TaxId also gets a Private/Public keypair and generating invoices means signing the document with that key. The amazing thing is that now accountants talk about the XML, which is the legal representation of the invoice. As a result, every year if you file your taxes, you go I to the government freely provided website , get into your account and most of the data is there for the exercise, including deducted money that you can get back. If you are a standard worker earning less than certain amount (very sensible, so the vast majority of workers fall in there) you don't even have to file your taxes. That's one thing that is good about this country.

mmsimanga 7y ago
What you have just said has thrown me into a tizz trying to understand what you have said. Could you please give a bit more practical details. Say I want to claim rent/transport/medical expenses. Will doctors, car rental place and landlords all issue me an electronic receipt?
- PeterisP 7y ago
  Not from Mexico, so it might be different for them, but one way how this works in some places is that the tax office gets all the electronic receipts from all the cash register/POS systems anyway, since that's how they monitor sales/vat/excise/etc taxes paid by the merchant and reduce the risks of "under the counter" sales where fake receipts are issued but taxes not paid on the sale. So if the doctor's office punches in my legal ID number with the receipt (or if the ID gets added automatically from the billing system that a large hospital would have), then when the office sends all their receipt files to the tax office, the tax office will automatically add that electronic receipt to my tax deduction.
- xtracto 7y ago
  Yes. Not all spending can be deducted. But for the ones you do, you have the right to ask for the "electronic invoice" and the business has to give it to you. When that happens they ask you for your TAX ID and then the business generates the invoice and your taxid and their taxid makes the tie. The Mexican IRS systems see all of this. So at the tax reporting moment, the system will have all that info. It is pretty neat actually. However I think it is possible bc in Mexico people are not that concerned with privacy and all that.

liziwizi 7y ago

I also want to brag about Tax-On-Web for Belgium. Development started over 15 years ago, it's been steadily improving over the years, it even works for linux users, it already fills in all tax details they already know (like wages) I love it!

Cthulhu_ 7y ago

Similar in NL; it used to be a desktop app (which IIRC was even distributed via diskettes or a CD-ROM but later just a download), nowadays it's a webapp. Also prefills most information from employers (who already pay your income tax for you every month), mortgages, banks, etc. The only complexity for me came when I bought my house (some costs are deductible) and when I had to report Bitcoin held at Coinbase (and for that I had to report the (EUR) on January 1st 2018 specifically).

52-6F-62 7y ago

Canada doesn't release its own software, but it certifies a selection of free and paid software of varying complexity. I'd like it if we could take up other, simpler models of sorting out income tax but I use software out of this pool† every year and its served me just fine: https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/e-services/e-services-individuals/netfile-overview/certified-software-netfile-program.html https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/e-services/... † usually StudioTax. I donated to them last year. It's not pretty software but it's effective and easy to use. https://www.studiotax.com/en/ https://www.studiotax.com/en/ "Our business model is similar to that of a street performer. You can use and enjoy our software and later decide if the experience was worth it and you can afford a donation. However, based on many users’ feedback, you should be wary of recent free offerings from big commercial organizations. To use our previous analogy, they are big circuses that send their clowns out to the street to attract unsuspecting customers to their tents and pressure them in paying for their overpriced shows."

finphil 7y ago
I concur. Studio Tax is not pretty but it gets the job done for most people.
morbm 7y ago
I used SimpleTax for the first time this year and it's a lot more intuitive than StudioTax which I used in the past. It may not be ideal for every situation, but it was much simpler for me.

cascom 7y ago

I was under the impression - perhaps falsely - that taxes in Brazil were nightmarishly complex?

rvr_ 7y ago
Its simple if your are an employee and complex if you are an employer. For the self employed there is a super simple filling up to a certain threshold. Companies also have additional requirements based on revenue brackets, number of employees and type of economic activities they do. Anything sligth complex eill require multiple agencies fees and byzanthine laws.
ratww 7y ago
There's a lot of players involved. IMO for regular people it's simple/cheap, but for companies/employers it's complex/expensive Federal government charges taxes on income, production, import/export and over bank operations; states charge consumption and vehicle taxes; cities charge service and property taxes. Then there's also contributions that employers pay for workers, and some that workers pay. However, consumption tax can compound itself (because of sales between distributors, or taxes over raw materials), so there's a "substitution" formula which can get pretty weird (but companies take care of it).

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Al-Khwarizmi 7y ago

In Spain it used to be a Java desktop app as well, the last incarnation of a software that started as a DOS program distributed in diskettes back in 1988. Now it's no longer a standalone program, but a website (not sure which technology, but it runs in current browsers without requiring Java installed, AFAIR). The government makes a draft declaration for you, if it's OK you just have to digitally sign your agreement and provide a bank account to pay or receive your return (if you haven't already done that in the past). Otherwise you need to edit it adding whatever they've missed, but this is only needed if you do complex stock trading, operate with money abroad, etc. For most people it's just skimming through it in case there is an obvious error, and confirming the draft. Once you confirm the draft, it takes only around 2-4 days for the tax return money to appear in your bank account. The website's UI is good. Spanish e-administration webapps are a bit hit-and-miss, some are dreadful (digital certificate request, I'm looking at you), but that particular one is fine and has always worked well for me.

benhurmarcel 7y ago
Same in France, it's a simple website. You receive a notification email, connect with a simple login and password, check that the pre-filled form is correct, and validate.

codeulike 7y ago

UK provides a web form. Pretty well done one considering the complexity. I think you can use your own software too if you like and theres some sort of submission api. The only out-of-date thing I've noticed on the UK one is stuff like 'this PDF of your tax return is 1.5mb, on a dial up modem this might take 5 mins to download' etc. And I guess some people might still be on that kind of link so fair enough edit: And yeah in the UK you dont have to file at all if your situation is simple (e.g. you just have one job and one source of income).

sleepykoala 7y ago
It's probably worth noting that most people in the UK don't have to file at all (if you're on a wage and not in the top tax band, it's all automatic in your paycheck), and if you have a dispute/complication you just write a simple letter to the tax office laying out your case.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

cjslep 7y ago

As an American living in Kanton Zürich, I used both (paid) TurboTax and (free) Privat Tax (straight from the cantonal government). Swiss one was way easier to understand by far. As a side effect of doing those taxes, it was easy to see my actual wealth and my actual net income for the year. Which in America is a sin.

evsasse 7y ago

I've used the mobile app on Android, it wasn't a joy (it still lacks some polishing), but it was certainly VERY straightforward. Personally I don't have lots of stuff to file, but I did everything under 1 hour, while still discovering how to use the app and learning a bunch of taxes nomenclature.

amq 7y ago

In Ukraine there is a government webapp where you can fill all possible tax forms, and they come mostly pre-filled. The only small hurdle is getting the private/public key, it's fast, but only happens upon request or if you have a bank account at supported banks. If you were only on a payroll, you don't need to declare anything at all, it happens automatically.

Reedx 7y ago

There are proposals in the US to do this. I think the best I've seen so far is Andrew Yang's plan: https://www.yang2020.com/policies/making-taxes-fun/ https://www.yang2020.com/policies/making-taxes-fun/ Opt in to have your taxes automatically done. National celebration of projects completed. Ability to specify where 1% of your taxes go. So not only make it easy to do, but try to make it fun and shift the mindset from burden to societal contribution.