Manual CIAT on Tax Intelligence
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Manual CIAT on Tax Intelligence Inter-American Center of Tax Administration - CIAT Countries participating in the Working Group: Brazil Canada Chile Colombia France The Netherlands United States of America Technical Coordination Brazil CIAT INDEX I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY..................................................................................... 4 II. INTRODUCTION................................................................................................... 6 III. SCOPE .................................................................................................................... 7 IV. OBJECTIVES ....................................................................................................... 8 V. MAIN CHALLENGES FACED BY TAX INTELLIGENCE. ................. 10 VI. TAX INTELLIGENCE ASPECTS OR ISSUES ...................................... 13 VI.1. SCOPE OF ACTION AND OBJECTIVES OF TAX INTELLIGENCE................................. 13 VI.2. STRUCTURE, POSITION AND FINANCIAL AUTONOMY OF THE TAX INTELLIGENCE UNITS IN THE ORGANIZATION CHART OF THE TAX ADMINISTRATION. .............................. 14 a. Centralized Structure ........................................................................................ 15 i. Advantages: ........................................................................................................ 16 ii. Disadvantages: .................................................................................................. 16 b. Decentralized structure..................................................................................... 16 i. Advantages: ........................................................................................................ 17 ii. Disadvantages: .................................................................................................. 17 c. Financial Autonomy........................................................................................... 17 VI.3. COORDINATION OF TAX INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES WITH OTHER STATE ENTITIES. 17 a. Exchange of economic-tax information between tax administrations .......... 18 b. Exchange of tax-economic information among tax administrations and the various state bodies .............................................................................................. 18 c. International exchange of economic and tax information.............................. 19 VI. 4. LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR CARRYING OUT TAX INTELLIGENCE. ........................... 21 a. Legal Authorities................................................................................................ 22 b. Basic Principles ................................................................................................. 23 c. Policies and Procedures.................................................................................. 25 d. Institutional protection obligation ..................................................................... 26 VI.5. PROFILE AND SKILLS OF THE EMPLOYEES THAT PARTICIPATE IN THE TAX INTELLIGENCE. ............................................................................................................. 27 VI.6. SOURCES OF INFORMATION AND TOOLS FOR TAX INTELLIGENCE......................... 32 a. Closed sources.................................................................................................. 33 i. Human Sources.................................................................................................. 33 ii. Signal Sources................................................................................................... 33 iii. Imagery Sources............................................................................................... 34 b. Open Sources.................................................................................................... 34 i. Public Sources.................................................................................................... 35 ii. Sources accessible by the tax administration................................................. 37 iii. Internal sources of the Tax Administrations ................................................... 37 VI.7. TECHNIQUES AND METHODOLOGIES OF THE TAX INTELLIGENCE ACTION ............. 38 a. Specialized operational techniques of Tax Intelligence................................. 39 i. Techniques of analysis and identification of targets ....................................... 39 ii. Handling informers ............................................................................................ 40 iii. Reconnaissance ............................................................................................... 43 iv. Interviewing ....................................................................................................... 43 v. Undercover activities and undercover operations .......................................... 44 vi. Surveillance....................................................................................................... 46 vii. Photography and filming ................................................................................. 47 viii. Search and seizure......................................................................................... 47 b. Methodology for producing knowledge ........................................................... 49 i. Planning............................................................................................................... 50 ii. Gathering............................................................................................................ 51 iii. Analysis and synthesis ..................................................................................... 52 iv. Findings and recommendations...................................................................... 53 v. Dissemination .................................................................................................... 53 VI.8. RESULTS AND PRODUCTS OF TAX INTELLIGENCE ................................................ 54 VI.9. ETHICAL AND MORAL PRINCIPLES OF THE TAX INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES............. 55 VII. CONCLUSION .................................................................................................. 58 VIII. GLOSSARY...................................................................................................... 60 PARTICIPANTS OF THE WORKING GROUP ON TAX INTELLIGENCE ....................................................................................................... 64 ANNEX 1: BEST PRACTICES ON TAX INTELLIGENCE...................... 66 ANNEX 2: INTERNAL DOCUMENTS RELATED WITH THE BEST PRACTICES ON TAX INTELLIGENCE ...................................................... 125 I. Executive Summary 1. The quick development reached by the globalization and information technology processes, while bringing significant progress to countries, have generated new and important challenges to tax administrations regarding tax obligation compliance controls. Among them, it is worth mentioning as a problem that has become widespread, the materialization of an environment more propitious to commit not only evasion and avoidance, but also tax crimes related to the creation of organizations that could be described as criminal, given their objectives and “modus operandi.” 2. Some of the characteristics of these organizations can be stressed – transnationalization - insofar as their actions go beyond borders; the adoption of global strategies, which enable them to combine and take advantage of normative deficiencies in various countries, such as the inability to exchange information, the cause of significant social damage, the use of modern technology and the notable expansion force due to systems connected to other groups and an underground network of links with public and private elements that definitely promote corruption and disqualification among government branches. 3. As for the impact on the tax field, these organizations follow the specific or main objective of committing tax evasion and fraud by acting through schemes that try to give a shroud of legality to their illegal operations, with a high infiltration and influence in public branches. 4. Thus, the usual audit and oversight routines based upon the data supplied by the taxpayers themselves in many cases have failed to unveil the composition and operation forms of such criminal organizations, which are more and more complex and professional. Concomitantly, new technological forms have been used in the execution of tax and customs crimes, because those who commit them have had the support of highly specialized professionals who legitimize the fruits of these illegal activities through intricate money laundering tactics 5. Under this ever increasing uncertainty, each day there are more obstacles to comply with the institutional mission of state organizations responsible for tax collection and oversight. 6. Thus it is imperative for these organizations to try to update, upgrade, and improve their administrative and legal structures to the level of these new challenges, so as to give their public agents instruments that promote the effective fight against these illegal actions. Then it is necessary to give tax administrations highly specialized units to investigate and detect tax crimes, which can also be related to other criminal activities such as money laundering and terrorist financing. These tax Intelligence units should have a close relationship with other specialized crime fighting organizations and should be capable of