Income Tax at Source: changes in 2021

[chca]

I’ve been informed by my employer that as of next year anyone who is taxed at source can ask to be retroactively taxed (at the beginning of the following year) filing a full return. Not sure if this is a federal thing, or a cantonal thing in response to the multiple federal changes.

This might be advantageous in certain cases such as for couples where one earns much more than the other, but I’ve not done the calculations.

Apparently there are a lot of changes related to at-source taxation coming next year (https://home.kpmg/ch/en/blogs/home/posts/2020/07/tax-at-source-2021.html)

Can anyone with some tax accountancy knowledge/interest explain the implications of these new rules?

[dbu]

To my knowledge, at least in canton BS, once you are over 120k income (and still on Quellensteuer, e.g. with a B permit), you have the right to fill in the full tax return.
Has been like that for quite a while, not sure if any changes from next year.

[chca]

Found a better breakdown on it… https://blogs.deloitte.ch/tax/2019/06/new-tax-at-source-legislation-federal-tax-administration-publishes-circular-letter-no-45.html

If I understand correctly, as of next tax year, to claim Pillar 3a contributions, etc. those taxed at source MUST ask to file a return (and then are obligated to do it). So the simplified taxed-at-source return form (a single page in my canton!) will no longer exist.

The circular cited is here: https://www.estv.admin.ch/dam/estv/fr/dokumente/bundessteuer/kreisschreiben/2004/1-045-D-2019.pdf.download.pdf/1-045-D-2019-f.pdf
Personally, I’m interested in the implications, but there is an infinite list of things I’d rather do than read tax law (and infinite number of professions I’d rather have than tax lawyer).

[chca]

Yes, I guess what it does is get rid of that minimum and also force people to file a full return to claim any reductions.

Last I looked, in my canton at least, the assumed deductions for certain things were already quite good (e.g., my actual transport costs are way lower than the assumed amount) so it might work out negatively for some and positively for others…

[MFV91]

AFAIK, the idea is that many people complained that it is not fair that people living in the same country and doing the same job are taxed differenty according to income and lenght-of-stay in the afore mentioned country.

I didn’t do exact calculations, but I compared with several swiss colleagues earning my same exact gross salary, and added deductions can be quite impressive (we’re talking about around 10-15% more taxes)…however, it depends a lot on the baseline tax % (canton-dependent) and on your job (ex: nighshifts, education-related expenses…).

I really look forward to save some money to be invested somewhere else than in Vaud government’s silly habit of remakig the roads every 2-3 weeks XD

[LeStache]

@dbu

To my knowledge, at least in canton BS, once you are over 120k income (and still on Quellensteuer, e.g. with a B permit), you have the right to fill in the full tax return.

And not just the right either but the obligation. All B permit holders earning over 120k should already receive the tax forms and have to return them. Except in Geneva where the limit is 500k. This has been in effect for at least 5 years.