From today people across Belgium will be able to fill in their annual tax return forms. People filing their taxes in Flanders this year will notice a significantly reduction in the number of codes on the form. Meanwhile, the Federal Finance Department says that the level of the tax-free allowance has been increased.
The number of federal taxation codes has fallen by 47 to 699. The Finance Department says that this is the lowest number of codes in 10 years. Meanwhile, the number of regional taxation codes on forms sent to people living in the 5 Flemish provinces has been reduced to 780, 59 fewer than last year.
At federal level, codes that have been scrapped include the code pertaining to the housing bonus and codes that needed to be filled in to obtain tax breaks for employing domestic staff. The level of tax reduction on sums that are given to charity has been lowered from 45% to 30%. In Flanders the tax allowance granted on money spent on so-called “Service Cheques”, cheques used to pay for domestic cleaning and ironing services, has been scrapped.
The Federal Finance Minister Jan Jambon (Flemish nationalist) told the press agency Belga that "We are making the tax return simpler. We are increasing the tax-free allowance, but with fewer items that are tax deductible" He added that the simplification process will continue in the coming years.
Always best to check
The majority of taxpayers, some 3.93 million people, will receive a pre-completed simplified tax return containing all the information that already known to the authorities. Last year, 93% of those that received a pre-completed returned accepted it without making any modifications. However, Finance Department officials stress that it remains important to check the contents of the form carefully.
The deadlines for filing in tax returns remain unchanged: 30 June for paper returns and 15 July for online. Returns involving specific income categories have until 16 October to be completed and filed with the Tax Office.
Last year, 2.17 million returns were submitted online, compared with just 141,000 on paper. Around 1.25 million returns are filed each year through accountants.