I imagine that one of the few things which unites human beings around the world is the nightmare of dealing with their tax offices. German govt loves bureaucracy and regulation so I suspect that they compete in the same league as HMRC.
Last year I got a letter from them, opened it and saw the title Grundsteuer B (Land Tax B) and stupidly dismissed it with the thought that it was all paid for by direct debit and so did not need to read further. Had I read further I would have understood that some politician with nothing better to do had found some sort of anomaly in the administration of said tax and had then gone to the top court and won the case. This meant that every property owner in the country had to tell the tax office what it already knew about their properties.
A reminder letter a month or two back pointed out that I was enjoying a graciously extended deadline to some time later in this month. To not make the relevant declaration in time would result in a fine etc. So I got on with it.
The guidance from the tax office to filling in the relevant annex of the tax office's own form ran to 41 pages. Admittedly most of those were screen shots and a lot of the commentary was to the effect of, "You can ignore this line" (so why not shorten the XX!!*!? form then?).
Then it turned out that the key questions could only be answered with the help of a document related to my flat which I would have to obtain from the Land Registry. So off I toddled to the LR only to be told on the intercom at the door that they don't see people in person any more - except by special appointment - and that I had to apply online. Until this last Monday it was the local regional hols which meant that I might not get it quickly. As it happens it arrived the day before yesterday and I sat down yesterday evening to answer a hitherto unanswerable three questions.
The tax office software kept telling me that I was putting information into one question which was inconsistent with the rest of the document. The 41 pages were of no help, not one little bit of help. Then I noticed a "?" icon and clicked on that. It said words to the effect of, "For example a property has three bits of data, A, B and C and they give the answer of D". And that was it.
Two of the three factors were purely bureaucratic quantities (a sort of administrative algebra) and one was the real world measurement of the surface area of the land. Now I'm not totally stupid and I do have a scientific education and a BSc and an MA but it took me 20 minutes to work out that this description must be another way of saying that there was a mathematical equation involved. A further 10 mins led me to the discovery that A/B x C = D. The computer then told me I'd got it right and I could finally hit "send".
But some questions arise:
a. If it takes a moderately educated bloke 30 mins to work out how to answer a question, how do they expect a less educated person to deal with it? Should they perhaps provide an example of the equation?
b. Given that the tax office and the land registry are both part of the govt and given that they are always banging on about the efficiencies of digitalisation, why doesn't the tax office get the LR to send the info to it? (I suspect that data protection could be the answer but they are both part of the same state system.)
c. Why does the tax office want the information it already has to be resubmitted?
d. If the software can tell me I'm answering a question requiring a numerical answer wrongly and then tell me when I've got it right, why doesn't it work out what the answer is. (It obviously can't do it because of the hurdle posed by b.)
e. Do politicians ever think when having a bright idea about tax reform?
f. If one annex of your tax return requires 41 pages of guidance, is that not a hint that the form could perhaps do with a bit of simplification?
Last year I got a letter from them, opened it and saw the title Grundsteuer B (Land Tax B) and stupidly dismissed it with the thought that it was all paid for by direct debit and so did not need to read further. Had I read further I would have understood that some politician with nothing better to do had found some sort of anomaly in the administration of said tax and had then gone to the top court and won the case. This meant that every property owner in the country had to tell the tax office what it already knew about their properties.
A reminder letter a month or two back pointed out that I was enjoying a graciously extended deadline to some time later in this month. To not make the relevant declaration in time would result in a fine etc. So I got on with it.
The guidance from the tax office to filling in the relevant annex of the tax office's own form ran to 41 pages. Admittedly most of those were screen shots and a lot of the commentary was to the effect of, "You can ignore this line" (so why not shorten the XX!!*!? form then?).
Then it turned out that the key questions could only be answered with the help of a document related to my flat which I would have to obtain from the Land Registry. So off I toddled to the LR only to be told on the intercom at the door that they don't see people in person any more - except by special appointment - and that I had to apply online. Until this last Monday it was the local regional hols which meant that I might not get it quickly. As it happens it arrived the day before yesterday and I sat down yesterday evening to answer a hitherto unanswerable three questions.
The tax office software kept telling me that I was putting information into one question which was inconsistent with the rest of the document. The 41 pages were of no help, not one little bit of help. Then I noticed a "?" icon and clicked on that. It said words to the effect of, "For example a property has three bits of data, A, B and C and they give the answer of D". And that was it.
Two of the three factors were purely bureaucratic quantities (a sort of administrative algebra) and one was the real world measurement of the surface area of the land. Now I'm not totally stupid and I do have a scientific education and a BSc and an MA but it took me 20 minutes to work out that this description must be another way of saying that there was a mathematical equation involved. A further 10 mins led me to the discovery that A/B x C = D. The computer then told me I'd got it right and I could finally hit "send".
But some questions arise:
a. If it takes a moderately educated bloke 30 mins to work out how to answer a question, how do they expect a less educated person to deal with it? Should they perhaps provide an example of the equation?
b. Given that the tax office and the land registry are both part of the govt and given that they are always banging on about the efficiencies of digitalisation, why doesn't the tax office get the LR to send the info to it? (I suspect that data protection could be the answer but they are both part of the same state system.)
c. Why does the tax office want the information it already has to be resubmitted?
d. If the software can tell me I'm answering a question requiring a numerical answer wrongly and then tell me when I've got it right, why doesn't it work out what the answer is. (It obviously can't do it because of the hurdle posed by b.)
e. Do politicians ever think when having a bright idea about tax reform?
f. If one annex of your tax return requires 41 pages of guidance, is that not a hint that the form could perhaps do with a bit of simplification?
