This is why Fiji decided to implement the revolutionary solution against tax fraud that TaxCore represents. But, more than just a tax-collecting platform, TaxCore serves as a perfect ally against the grey economy, which was Fiji’s main objective to choose it in the first place. To truly fight the grey economy which costs many countries in billions, one must also organize the way fiscal atmosphere looks.

What Is the Overall Result in Fiji?

Two years later, and the overall situation in Fiji has significantly improved. One of the largest issues this nation was facing was the fact people didn’t ask for receipts. Naturally, this gives more than enough space for taxpayers to commit tax fraud at the cost of consumers’ rights. The culture in Fiji is such that asking for a receipt represents disbelief, and, as such, people frown upon this. The state of Fiji and Data Tech International had to come up with a way to motivate customers to ask for a receipt; and the best solution was to reward them.

TaxCore’s receipts are revolutionary for the way they look and present the information to a buyer. All the items are listed so clearly that a consumer is never confused, but more importantly, they come with a QR code at the bottom that a consumer can scan. By scanning this code, a customer can see a digital version of the invoice on their smartphone.

Moreover, they can report the receipt immediately if something doesn’t seem right. By doing this, they are taking part in the Customer Compliance Award program – which is a form of a lottery where a consumer can receive an award. The awards can span from a simple dinner for two, to a new car.

This plan motivated Fiji buyers to ask for receipts, which for the most part, helped shut down the grey economy.

Recently, Fiji announced that they’ve hit the mark of 200 million issued receipts. Although one might believe this number isn’t fascinating given how it has been two years – it is actually more than satisfactory for a couple of reasons.

The Rollout Process

Since implementing TaxCore presents a big change, the tax authority in Fiji must do this process in a precise and thorough manner. Therefore, Fiji’s Tax Authority decided to split taxpayers into groups – starting with realtors and pharmacies.

The first group consisted of these two industries only, and the new groups are expected to be rolled out soon. Issuing 200 million receipts is captivating because the number is based exclusively on supermarkets and pharmacies.

This is a clear sign that:

1. Consumers asked for receipts regularly, and
2. Taxpayers abide by the law

Hitting this mark is a clear signal that Fiji and TaxCore are successfully changing the fiscal and tax climate in the country.

Now that FRCS has collected more than 200 million fiscal invoices from onboarded supermarkets and pharmacies with over 100 different POS vendors and few ESDC vendors, it is time for new groups.

FRCS is now ready to take other industries into scope, especially hospitality, put on hold due to the COVID-19 crisis. Tourism and hospitality are two branches that have started to bring in a lot of revenue to the country, therefore Fiji deems it important to bring these industries into the system starting from January 2022, as delayed due to COVID-19.

The situation will only get better once all the industries have been properly enrolled in the system.

The post Fiji tax fraud – The State of Fiji Registers Its 200 Millionth Receipt – And Here’s Why That’s Important appeared first on Dti.

While the developed countries will most definitely feel the effect of coronavirus mostly in the unemployment rate, it is not them who will suffer the most. Indeed, developing economies that are still transitioning to stable economies and highly depend on the help of the 1^st world will be hit the hardest by coronavirus. Is the global pandemic already making its mark on the world? Unfortunately, yes it does – and we are already facing many changes.

The Financial Shockwave for developing economies

Developing countries, such as Bangladesh, sub-Saharan countries, and many others, strongly depend on the external help they get from many countries of Europe and the USA. Now that nearly everyone is economically struggling, each country has turned to itself, naturally prioritizing its citizens before anyone else. So, where does this leave developing economies that can’t make it on their own, How will they find a way to come out of the coronavirus crisis unscathed?

Unfortunately, nobody has offered a solution yet, but we are witnessing a lot of negative effects. Bangladesh, which spent millions on educating its young nation and improving its health care system, will probably be forced to stop funding these two areas. The money will go directly into fighting the epidemic and the potential economic crisis following it.

This is only one country out of many that are suffering from the same or worse effects from COVID-19. And this is exactly what might set the world back, nullifying the many accomplishments we’ve made so far.

In 1990, 36% of the world’s population was considered to be living on a little bit more than $1 a day. This sums up to about 1.9 billion people, more than North America and Europe combined. By 2016, this number dropped to approximately 700 million people, which represents a revolutionary improvement. This sums up to only 10% of the world’s population.

Mostly, some of the Asian and African countries owe these numbers to their first-world partners, whom they have put a lot of hope into stabilizing their economies. In India, for example, global initiatives saved over 170 million people from poverty, while Bangladesh lifted over 20 million people out of poverty.

Now, these numbers are rising again, and it is a legitimate reason to worry because poverty leads to illness and disease.

Cutting-down investment

Over 90 countries have already asked for emergency help from the International Monetary Fund, however, not many developed, well-standing economies are willing to help for now. The USA alone has decided to invest almost $3 trillion to help its working class and small businesses and, protect people from falling into poverty. Japan invested almost a trillion, and many European countries have followed the same path.

India, on the other hand, has decided to invest only $22.5 billion, and Pakistan plans to spend only $7.5 billion on helping its working class, even though it is the fifth largest and most populated country in the world.

Now that countries have come to a halt, we have yet to see whether the countries of the first world will be able to help those in need. Many experts say that this might be necessary because the biggest reason the world recovered from the WW2 is precisely strong economic ties between the countries. In a way, everyone hopes that this already established and tested tactic will come to life one more time to help humanity through a difficult time.

The post The coronavirus’ effect on Developing Economies appeared first on Dti.

Many are wondering, what now?

We Need a Quick Fix

Most governments are genuinely worried about how businesses will handle this situation. However, not many countries can afford to help their private sectors, at least for now. On top of that, the health care systems are crumbling under the pressure of the new virus and the number of infected people across the globe. This automatically means that most governments will prioritize helping hospitals instead of corporations.

For companies in many countries, this means that they will have to rely on themselves; or to be more precise, on the money they managed to save up over the years. The situation the world is currently facing came out of the blue, and as such, nobody was prepared for it. Now, what are the plans corporations are coming up with, and does it by any chance include taking advantage of the crisis?

Who Is Protecting the Buyers?

Due to the pandemic, countries don’t have the time nor resources to monitor their taxpayers properly, which automatically means that buyers are quite unprotected. Has what we feared the most started to happen?

In times like these, the population rests on the idea that producers of general goods and medical supplies will keep their prices intact, competing with each other and creating the best price for consumers. Unfortunately, the percentage of those who are taking advantage of the epidemics is rising.

According to this NY Times article, many pharmacies in the USA alone have raised the prices of their products within a day, making them twice, if not three times more expensive than only 24 hours before. A lot of consumers have started complaining that some supermarkets have started doing the same thing. This is where a country’s tax system comes in to play, and it might be the right time for every government to assess the functionality of its tax collection system. This system serves as the forefront in protecting both the general population and the economy of a country.

So, how modern are these systems? Are they digital yet? And can they actually help their governments the way they were intended to? The sad truth is that in most countries, they’re not. They are somehow still stuck in the 20^th century, and this might be the right time to consider a change.

TaxCore Offers the Perfect Solution

As a platform, TaxCore offers the most modern tax collecting system that ensures transparency. Moreover, it has demonstrated to be the best tool to fight against TAX evasion and VAT fraud in the countries that implemented it. Our platform allows for tax offices to have an insight into every single receipt going through a system, no matter whether it comes from a supermarket, pharmacy, gas station or a restaurant.

And while some governments are now faced with a problem of controlling the prices of medical supplies, the countries which implemented TaxCore know exactly whom to keep their eye on.

In a recent development, the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, was asked what to do with drugstores that raised the prices of face masks, and his answer was short and to the point – revoke their licenses. Although quite an effective solution, having a good tax system could easier help identify businesses that are breaking the local laws better, and separate bad apples from good apples.

How Do We Protect Consumers’ Rights?

All over the world, people have started panic-buying the necessities, medicine included. In the Republic of Fiji, as of March 19th when the state of emergency has been declared by the Prime Minister, TaxCore has registered a major increase in prices of face masks, antibiotics, and painkillers.

A lot of pharmacies have started selling face masks for prices of up to 2 or 3 times higher. Checking our TaxCore database, we easily confirmed that the difference in prices of these products from January up to today was over 15%.

Having a clear insight in these practices, the FRCS (Fiji Revenue and Customs Service) can easily put an end to these. All the proof they might need is already in the system, so they can easily penalize any business taking advantage of the present situation.

Once the epidemic comes to an end, one thing remains for sure – many governments will have to make a significant change in the way they govern local economic activities. And the change must come from modernizing taxation in the first place. To see how TaxCore can help you in times of crisis, feel free to get in touch through our contact us page.

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