Voluntary tax complianceCooperation between DIAN and Skatteverket

Anders Stridh & Lennart Wittberg, 1 – 5 June 2015

Service & culture

Swedens most modern government agency

2011

The jury:

“The Swedish Tax Agency has changed from

being a feared tax collector to becoming a

well liked service organisation. The

development has been persistent and

focused. Service and treatment of taxpayers

have improved. The culture of the

organisation has changed.”

4

The purpose of communication and service

• Make it easy to comply – handle complexity

• Reduce unintentional errors

– Reduce costs for the tax administration

– Reduce compliance costs for the taxpayers

• Improve voluntary compliance

• Increase trust in the tax system

Trust and service delivery

5

“Trust comes on foot and goes away on horseback”

“…ample empirical evidence exists that satisfaction and trust are

positively correlated. …show a significant association between

satisfaction with public service delivery and trust in government…”

“…the empirical results suggest that the breaking down of trust is

easier to accomplish than the building up of trust. In other words, the

impact of a negative experience with a public agency is much more

pronounced than the effect of a positive one.”

Source: Kampen, Vad deWalle, Bouckaert, “Assessing the

relation between satisradtion with public service delivery and

trust in government”

Attitudes?

Impact on trust?

Three different attitudes

C B

Negative impact

on trust in the

Tax Administration

Positive impact

on trust in the

Tax Administration

A

Negative impact

on trust in the

Tax Administration

Walking in the customers shoes

Have you, as citizens, experienced the different attitudes in your contact with

another organization?

Give examples and reflect upon your own reaction in these situation.

Could these situations been handled in another way? If so, how?

C B A

Staff ledgers

- Restaurants and hair dressers

• Introduced 2007

• All traders must keep a ledger

– Employees in/out

• Spot checks (unannounced)

– Check if employees noted in ledger

– € 1000 fine if not

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3

• 7,5 million returns

• 70 % electronically

3rd party reporting

• Employers

• Banks

• Credit institutes

• Insurance companies

3rd party reporting

• Salaries, benefits etc.

• Pensions etc.

• Interest on savings

• Stock dividends

• Gain or Loss from sale of shares and funds

• Interest paid on loans

• Premiums on pension insurances

• Sold shares

• Sold houses

• Sold apartments in condominiums

3rd party reporting

• 60 – 80 million statements per year

• 99,3 % electronically

How people perceive on-line services

• They don’t provide confirmations and feedback

• Trust in the service will affect the willingness to use it again

• People perceive e-services as social actors and judge them in the same way as human interactions

• This means that e-services is not just about functionality and technology

• E-services should be perceived as responsive, express empathy and provide confirmation

18Source: Tan, Benbasat, Cenfetelli, “Building

Citizen Trust towards e-government Services:

Do High Quality Websites Matter?

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Demands

Needs

Questions

Forms

Applications

Security

Confirmation

Respect

Guiding principles – customer

relations

Understanding the customers situation

Solve the problem, not just answer the

question

Understandable language and manage

the further contact

We apologize if something goes wrong

Effective interactions where the user is in

control – different arenas

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Each encounter with a taxpayer

provides an opportunity for the agency

to increase the trust of the public

Our strategy

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We try to put the taxpayer in the centre, not the

channels, but we provide different channels

Our task is not to inform the taxpayer, it is to

make the taxpayer informed

Important factors:

• Can the problem be solved at the

first contact?

• Look at the cost for solving the

problem, not just the cost for

each contact

Service offices

Cooperation between authorities

Customer orientation

Cost efficient

High skilled staff

What can a service officer do?

Give general information

Give information about cases

Help with applications

Make decisions concerning easier cases

Support with self services

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The contact

The moment of truth

Case study

Failure demand

When things

go wrong…

Statements regarding the

Tax Account

Lets stop sending them out

and save some money!

Lets see what happend

I want a copy of the statement regarding the

tax account.

Can you fax it to me?

No statement?Use e-service?

Too complicated.

I call them instead.

Number of fax

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

16000

18000

Vec

ka n

r 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51

2008

2009

Result!

Increased number of phone calls

70 % increase of number of fax concerning tax account

The taxpayers were frustrated

The staff was frustrated

The e-service was not built from a user perspective

We created failure demand

We started to develop an e-mail solution

Not every day, but often she comes

to the service office. She is sick,

has social phobia, is uncertain and

very quiet. I helped her a few times

and we've got a good contact. She

can express herself when she talks,

but not in writing.

When she comes into our office,

she tries to get eye contact with

me. I know that if I nod to her she

understands that I will help her

soon. It feels good. She feels

secure in my presence. Previously,

she turned around and went home.

Now she no longer turns back in

the door. Now she thanks.

(Service officer)

Bring the voice of the taxpayer into the organisation

"After several attempts to send e-mails I now understand that the issue must be very short and very precise, otherwise the answer is

vague or you refer to a whole document. "

“I just want to say that the Tax Agency is great! You are always friendly and very helpful. I can not think of any institution, or company

that is as service-minded as you are. Thank you for that!