swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

Europaudvalget 2017
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EUROPEAN

COMMISSION

Brussels, 29.3.2017

SWD(2017) 124 final

COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT

Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

EUROPEAN COMMISSION

DIRECTORATE-GENERAL

TAXATION AND CUSTOMS UNION

Resources

Management of programmes and EU Training

FISCALIS 2020 PROGRAMME

2015 PROGRESS REPORT

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Contents

3.1

3.2

3.3

4.1

4.2

4.3

4.4

5.1

5.2

5.3

ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

INTRODUCTION

FISCALIS 2020 in a nutshell

The Performance Measurement Framework

Methodological Considerations – Progress Report 2015

PROGRAMME YEAR 2015 – BASIC PARAMETERS

Introduction

Budget

Participants

Proposals and Actions

PROGRESS IN RELATION TO THE OPERATIONAL OBJECTIVES

Table of indicators

Cross-cut indicators of collaboration robustness between programme stakeholders

Objective 1: to enhance the understanding and implementation of Union law in the field of taxation

5.4

Objective 2: to implement, improve, operate and support the European Information Systems for

taxation

5.5

Objective 3: to support the improvement of administrative procedures and the sharing of good

administrative practices

5.6

5.7

6.1

6.2

Objective 4: to reinforce skills and competencies of taxation officials

Objective 5: to support administrative cooperation activities

PROGRESS IN RELATION TO THE ANNUAL WORK PROGRAMME

Introduction

Part 1 – To support the fight against tax fraud, tax evasion and aggressive tax planning - Case Study

6.3

Part 2 – To support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by securing exchange of

information - Case Study

6.4

Part 3 – To Support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by supporting

administrative cooperation - Case Study

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6.5

Part 4 – To Support the implementation of Union law by enhancing administrative capacity of

participating countries with a view to assisting in reducing administrative burden of tax authorities and

compliance costs for taxpayers - Case Study

6.6

Part 5 – To support the implementation of Union law - Case Study

CONCLUSIONS

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ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

The following acronyms are used in this document:

Abbreviation

AEOI

AES

AFF

AFF WV

ART

AWP

BPM

CACT

CCN-CSI

CLO

COPIS

DAC2

EAF

ECAS

ECNtc

EIS

EMCS

ERP

ESDEN

EUIPO

EUROSTAT

FPG

F2020

ITEG

MFF

MLC

MOSS

MSA

MSW

N/A

NEA

PAOE

PDA

PICS

PMF

SAF-T

SEED-on-Europa

SLA

SPEED

TEDB

TIN

TSS

TOD

VAT

VIES

Meaning

Automatic Exchange of Information

Automated Export System

Action Follow up Form

Action Follow up Form for Working Visits

Activity Reporting Tool

Annual Work Programme

Business Process Modelling

Committee on Administrative Cooperation for Taxation

Common Communications Network - Common Systems Interface

Central Liaison Office

System for Protection of Intellectual Property Rights (Counterfeiting and Piracy)

Directive 2014/107/EU

Direct Taxation

Event Assessment Form

European Commission

European Commission Authentication System

European Communication Network for taxation and customs

European Information Systems

Excise Movement Control System

Enterprise Resources Planning

European Statistical Data Exchange Network

European Intellectual Property Office

European Statistical Office of the European Union

Fiscalis Project Group

Fiscalis 2020 programme

Indirect Tax Expert Group

Joint action

Multiannual Financial Framework

Multi-Lateral Controls

Mini-One-Stop-Shop

Member State

Member State Administration

Member State Warning

Not available

National Excise Application

Presences in administrative offices / participation in administrative enquiries

Partially Denatured Alcohol

Programmes Information and Collaboration Space

Performance Measurement Framework

Standard Audit File for Tax Purposes

System for Exchange of Excise data on Europa website

Service Level Agreement

Single Portal for Entry or Exit of Data

Taxes in Europe Database

Taxation Identification Number

Taxation Statistic System

Turnover Data

Value Added Tax

VAT Information Exchange System

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VIES-on-the-Web

VOeS

VoW

VAT Information Exchange System on the internet

VAT on eServices Scheme

VIES-on-the-Web

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

2015 was the first standard year of operations under the programme, in contrast with 2014 which was

somewhat exceptional due to its shorter duration and the start of the new programme. Some of the trends

were confirmed during the year, with the continuation of slight increases in the total budget and the spending

on IT systems. However, 2015 reversed the trend of decreased numbers of participants, with a significant

increase surpassing the last three years in the levels of participation, as well as in the number of face-to-face

meetings organised under the programme.

The indicators obtained under the framework in 2015 give an overall positive assessment, both from the

business data perspective and from the feedback obtained from the action managers and the participants to

the activities. The indicators suggest that in 2015 the programme was on course to fulfilling its objectives and

that it played an important role in facilitating the implementation and development of EU taxation policies

through its European Information Systems, joint actions and human competency building.

The IT area remains the largest part of the programme budget, and the development and maintenance of

European Information Systems in the area of taxation remain entirely dependent on the programme. An

important new system was launched in 2015, concerning the automatic exchange of information between tax

administrations (AEOI-DAC1). Many more systems entered research and development phases thanks to the

support of the programme.

The Mini-One-Stop-Shop was one of the key initiatives in the EU taxation area in 2014, but it became

operational on 1 January 2015. In its first year of operations, more than 12 000 traders registered on the

system across all 28 EU Member States.

In the area of joint actions, the programme supported a rising number of activities in 2015. The cooperation

between the EC and national administrations in the development and implementation of taxation policies

would be impossible without the use of project groups, seminars, workshops, working visits, multilateral

controls, capacity building activities and other types of joint actions.

The year was also marked by a successful introduction of a new type of joint action - Presences in

administrative offices / participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE) – which is already widely used, with

49 operational actions in 2015. During the year, an important groundwork was made for the introduction of

another new type of joint actions - the expert teams. TAXUD actively assisted the programme beneficiaries in

preparing two detailed proposals for expert teams, both in the area of IT collaboration, which were eventually

included for realisation in the 2016 Annual Work Programme.

In the area of training, while there were no new releases of eLearning courses during the year, important

update was done on 12 courses on the VAT Directive, which were released in 2016 in 15 languages.

The key

strengths and achievements

that can be deduced from the analysis of the indicators:



Increased demand for programme support.

Successful introduction of a new type of joint actions - Presences in administrative offices /

participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE)

High level of achievement of results of the joint actions is reported by the action managers.

Very positive assessment of the achieved results of the joint actions, their usefulness and

met expectations by national tax officials who participated in them.

Networking among programme participants is increasing.

The European Information Systems are regularly upgraded and improved and resistant to

increased volume of data traffic.

Successful roll out of the Mini-One-Stop-Shop IT system

The increased use of online collaboration (PICS) by national and European tax officials

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The

conclusions

from the previous Progress Report for 2014 have been or are in the process of being

followed up (see table 17 at the end of the report for a complete overview). The 2015 indicators do not

warrant any specific new conclusions, but a number of those from 2014 could be further specified or updated:

Provide additional support to the sharing of programme outputs

Address the participants' response rate under the Performance Measurement Framework

In relation to Conclusion number 3 of the 2014 report:

Provide additional support to networking and the use

of the programme outputs

In relation to Conclusion number 7 of the 2014 report

Facilitate the collection and processing of data under

the Performance Measurement Framework

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3.1

INTRODUCTION

FISCALIS 2020 in a nutshell

The EU Regulation 1286/2013 established the multiannual action programme Fiscalis 2020 for the period

2014-2020 with the aim to improve the proper functioning of the taxation systems in the internal market by

enhancing cooperation between participating countries, their tax authorities and their officials. Total budget

foreseen for this programme period is 234.3 million euros. The programme represents a continuation of the

earlier generations of programmes Fiscalis 2007 and Fiscalis 2013, which have significantly contributed to

facilitating and enhancing cooperation between tax authorities within the Union.

Figure 1: Fiscalis 2020 programme objectives

The Fiscalis 2020 specific objective:



The specific objective of the programme shall be to support the fight against tax fraud, tax

evasion and aggressive tax planning and the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by

ensuring exchange of information, by supporting administrative cooperation and, where necessary

and appropriate, by enhancing the administrative capacity of participating countries with a view to

assisting in reducing the administrative burden on tax authorities and the compliance costs for

taxpayers.

The Fiscalis 2020 operational objectives:



to implement, improve, operate and support the European Information Systems for taxation;



to support the improvement of administrative procedures and the sharing of good

administrative practices



to support administrative cooperation activities;

to reinforce the skills and competence of tax officials;

to enhance the understanding and implementation of Union law in the field of taxation;



There are three types of activities that are organised under the programme:

Joint actions (JA)

- bringing together officials from the participating countries - these are most commonly

project groups, working visits, workshops and seminars. The programme covers the cost of organisation and

participation to these activities.

Types of joint actions:

(i) seminars and workshops;

(ii) project groups, generally composed of a limited number of countries, operational during a limited period of

time to pursue a predefined objective with a precisely described outcome;

(iii) bilateral or multilateral controls and other activities provided for in Union law on administrative

cooperation, organised by two or more participating countries, which include at least two Member States;

(iv) working visits organised by the participating countries or another country to enable officials to acquire or

increase their expertise or knowledge in tax matters;

(v) expert teams, namely structured forms of cooperation, with a non-permanent character, pooling expertise

to perform tasks in specific domains, in particular in the European Information Systems, possibly with the

support of online collaboration services, administrative assistance and infrastructure and equipment facilities;

(vi) public administration capacity-building and supporting actions;

(vii) studies;

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(viii) communication projects;

(ix) any other activity in support of the overall, specific and operational objectives and priorities set out in

Articles 5 and 6 of the Fiscalis 2020 regulation, provided that the necessity for such other activity is duly

justified;

European Information Systems (EIS) building

- these systems and the IT capacity building are

indispensable for the cooperation among taxation authorities. The programme covers the cost of acquisition,

development, installation, maintenance and day-to-day operation of the Union components of EIS.

Common training activities

- training materials and electronic learning modules play a vital part in

developing the human competency component of the tax authorities in the EU. The programme covers the

development cost of the common training materials, including electronic training modules.

The Commission and the participating countries (EU member states and countries recognised as candidates

or potential candidates for EU membership having concluded international agreements for their participation

in the Fiscalis 2020 programme) decide jointly on the annual priorities of the programme by adopting each

year the Annual Work Programme. The implementation of the programme is under direct management by the

Commission, meaning that it is centrally managed by DG TAXUD. It is implemented financially on the basis

of grant agreements with the participating countries (joint actions), and procurements (mostly for European

Information Systems and common training activities).

3.2

The Performance Measurement Framework

The Article 16 of the Fiscalis 2020 regulation stipulates that the Commission shall monitor the implementation

of the programme and actions under it on the basis of indicators and make the outcome of such monitoring

public.

The final evaluation of the Fiscalis 2013 programme equally made the recommendation that "the

Commission, in close cooperation with the Member States, should set up a results-based monitoring and

evaluation (M&E) system for the Fiscalis programme."

In order to achieve this purpose, the Commission established in 2014 a Performance Measurement

Framework (PMF) to be implemented with the start of the new programme. The PMF is based on the

intervention logic (see Figure 3), which describes the logical step-by-step link between the wider problems

and needs addressed by the programme and the programme's objectives, inputs, activities, outputs, results

and impacts.

The PMF relies both on the quantitative (indicators) and qualitative (reporting and interpretation) data for

assessing the progress achieved.

The indicators can be divided into two categories:

Output and Result indicators

– these are first and second order effects that can be directly attributed to the

programme. Outputs refer to those effects (most often tangible products) achieved immediately after

implementing an activity, while the results look at the mid-term effects or the difference made on the ground

thanks to the outputs. Both types of indicators are collected annually, reflected in the Progress Report and

are linked to the operational objectives of the programme.

Impact indicators

– they indicate the long-term effects of the programme by measuring its contribution to

the broader policy areas, where programme activities are only one of the contributing factors. They mostly

rely on the use of existing external indicators (not collected by PMF surveys) and will be collected together

with the two evaluation exercises (to be held in 2018 and 2020). They are linked to the higher-level specific

objectives of the programme.

The PMF uses both its own data collection tools and the data gathered externally. The PMF’s own data

collection tools gather feedback from programme stakeholders and are summarised in the table below. The

external data is collected either by other organisations at a global level or inside DG TAXUD of the

Commission.

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Figure 2: PMF data collection tools

Tool

Action Reporting

Tool

(ART)

Proposal form

Action Follow up

Form (AFF)

Action Follow up

Form for working

visits

Event Assessment

Form (EAF)

Programme Poll

When is the data submitted?

At the beginning of each activity

Who is submitting the data?

Action managers

In February, one form per action or one Action managers

form each year for multi-annual actions

Within three months after the end of the Participants to the working visit

working visit

Three months after the end of an event or

yearly in case of project groups or similar

activities longer than 1 year

Every 18 months – to be launched in:



Mid-2015, beginning 2017, mid-

2018, end 2019

Participants to an event or

members of a project group or

similar activities

All

tax

officials

the

participating countries

The PMF follows the annual reporting cycle. It takes into consideration a calendar year of activities initiated

or organised under the programme. The drafting of the Progress Report starts in the following year once the

data collection process is finalised. Following data analysis and consultation with stakeholders, it is published

toward the end of the year. The Progress Report represents a summary of the main output and result

indicators and gives an assessment of the overall progress achieved.

The mid-term evaluation (in 2018) and the final evaluation (in 2020) of the programme make full use of the

Progress Reports and in addition report on the progress in relation to the impact indicators.

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Figure 3: Intervention logic of the Fiscalis 2020 programme

Impacts

The functioning of the taxation

systems in the internal market is

improved.

Curbed tax fraud, tax evasion

and aggressive tax planning.

Effective implemention of Union

law in the field of taxation (by

supporting administrative

cooperation & exchange of

information)

Reduced administrative burden

on tax administrations and

compliance costs for tax payers.

Results

Collaboration between MS, their

administrations and officials in

the field of taxation is enhanced.

The correct application of and

compliance with Union law in the

field of taxation is supported.

The European Information

Systems for taxation effectively

facilitate information

management by being available.

Administrative procedures and

good practices identified,

developed and shared.

Skills and competences of tax

officials reinforced.

Effective administrative

cooperation.

Problems / needs

Diverging application and implementation of EU tax law

Inadequate response to tax fraud, avoidance and evasion

Pressure on national tax administrations to exchange increasing quantities of data and information

securely and rapidly

High administrative burden for tax payers and tax administrations

Slow technical progress in the public sector

Overall objective

Improve the proper functioning of the taxation systems in the internal market by enhancing cooperation

between participating countries, their tax authorities and their officials

Theory of change

(incl. EU added value)

F2020 finances supporting

measures to ensure that

the EU tax policy is applied

in an effective, efficient,

convergent and harmonised

way, in particular by:



Boosting the

effectiveness of the

work of participating

countries’ national

taxation administrations

(inter alia by facilitating

exchange of

information).



Enhancing networks

between tax officials

across Member States

through which

information can be

shared.

Inputs

EUR 234 million to provide

support in the form of:



grants;



public procurement

contracts;



reimbursement of costs

incurred by external

experts

Human resources (EC and

national tax authorities)

Activities

(grouped into projects)

Joint actions:

Seminars & workshops;

project groups; working

visits; bi/multilateral

controls; expert teams;

public administration

capacity building and

supporting actions; studies

and communication

projects.

Development,

maintenance, operation and

quality control of

systems

Common

training

actions

Outputs

Joint actions:



Recommendations /

guidelines (including

action plans /

roadmaps)



Best practices



Analysis



Networking &

cooperation

IT systems:



New (components of)

IT systems at users’

disposal



Continued operation of

existing IT systems

Training:



Common training

content developed

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3.3

Methodological Considerations – Progress Report 2015

The PMF to a large extent relies on the use of its own surveys for data collection. If we look at the

response rates for all three surveys (see Figure 4 below), they can be regarded as satisfactory.

Figure 4: Response rates in 2015 for PMF surveys, with 2014 data shown in brackets

EAF (Participants to

joint actions, except

working visits)

Number of participants

invited to respond under

the PMF

Number of received valid

responses

Response rate

2159 (1660)

1215 (1051)

56% (63%)

AFF WV

(participants to

working visits)

330 (75)

207 (53)

63% (71%)

AFF (Action managers)

271 (164)

189 (114)

70% (70%)

If we compare the response rates for 2015 with those from 2014, we can observe that the response rate

for the action managers remained at 70%, while the response rates for the participants to working visits

and participants to other types of joint action decreased by 8% and 7% respectively.

TAXUD and national programme teams should pay attention to these response rates and try to bring them

above the 70% mark. Changes scheduled to take place in the survey distribution should provide some

support in this respect.

From 2017, a new system will be in place for inviting participants of joint actions to take the PMF survey.

The Action Reporting Tool (ART), which contains the names and emails of all participants, will be sending

automatic reminders to programme participants. This change will reduce the manual workload currently

involved in the sending of the PMF surveys, but it is also hoped that it will help push up the response rate

as the participants would receive invitations to their inbox from the programme tool, rather than through

the outside tool EUsurvey on which the PMF survey is located. Greater awareness about the PMF, which

will also be promoted by the publication of Progress Reports and the results of the surveys, should help

further demonstrate the value of such surveys to the stakeholders and increase their motivation to take

part in them.

With regards to the data collected from external sources, outside the surveys, it is worth mentioning that

this data is collected as part of other monitoring exercises and reflects the methodological approach

established for those exercises.

Finally, it is worth mentioning here that in the 2015 EAF survey, a new question was added making the

obtained data on the use of the outputs in national administrations more precise, compared to the

previous 2014 survey.

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4.1

PROGRAMME YEAR 2015 – BASIC PARAMETERS

Introduction

2015 was the first standard year of operations under the programme, in contrast with 2014 which was

somewhat exceptional due to its shorter duration and the start of the new programme. Some of the trends

were confirmed during the year, with the continuation of slight increases in the total budget and the

spending on IT systems. However, 2015 reversed the trend of decreased numbers of participants, with a

significant increase surpassing the last three years in the levels of participation.

The year was also marked by a successful introduction of a new type of joint action - Presences in

administrative offices / participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE) – which is already widely used by

some countries, with 49 operational actions in 2015.

4.2

Budget

The overview in Figure 5 below summarises the programme funding according to the four main activity

types. In order to make the table more meaningful, the budgetary information for the previous years has

been added.

Figure 5: Committed

expenses per year and main action categories under the programme

Joint actions

Training

Studies

TOTAL

AWP

EU Annual

Budget

Amount MFF

2012

€6,054,000.00

€600,000.00

€21,081,083.69

€288,877.00

€28,023,960.69

€28,200,000.00

€29,400,000.00

2013

€5,044,000.00

€682,472.08

€23,425,745.06

€389,243.80

€29,541,460.94

€30,000,000.00

€30,950,000.00

2014

€4,630,000.00

€908,585.18

€23,053,874.72

€2,184,539.26

€30,776,999.16

€30,777,000.00

2015

€4,300,000.00

€600,003.24

€24,691,254.51

€1,375,690.06

€30,966,947.81

€31,025,000.00

As is standard for the programme, the vast majority of funding in 2015 went into the development and

operation of European Information Systems, followed by the organisation of joint actions and the studies.

We can notice that over the years the expenditure on joint actions has been on the whole decreasing,

which is largely due to the decrease in the number of participants up to 2015. As these are committed and

not actual expenses, they are based on advanced estimates of possible numbers of participants. Any rise

in the number of participants in the current year might therefore only have an impact on the actual

expenses and the projected budget in the coming year. The IT budget continued with its trend of gradual

increase over the years. However, given that there were simultaneously decreases in the numbers of

commissioned studies and training expenses, the overall budget for 2015 stayed nearly identical to the

2014 budget.

4.3

Participants

The number of total participants

(which

measures all instances of participation in activities and allows for

the same people to have taken part in multiple activities) shows an important reversal of the trend of

decrease in participation levels.

The table compares committed amounts for the last four years, since the actual expenses are not

finalised for all the years.

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Figure 6: Number of participants

in joint actions per year under the Fiscalis 2013 and Fiscalis

2020 programmes

Evolution of the number of

programme participants

4882

2011

4101

2012

3719

2013

3400

2014

4433

2015

The participation to programme activities rose by 30% in 2015 compared to 2014. Even when we account

for the exceptional nature of the programme year 2014 (which was shorter in duration), the 2015 levels of

participation equally surpassed those of 2012 and 2013. This testifies to an increased business need for

activities and physical meetings in 2015.

Figure 7: Overview of participants per country in 2015

Participants per country in 2015

254

211

125

292

130

200

136

135

237

192 192

56 81

177 194

152 137

241

151

190 185

126 150

124

If we look at the distribution of participants by country, we can see that all the countries are utilizing the

programme, but that there are countries that, considering the size of their administrations, do so to a

greater extent than others. This is in line with the voluntary nature of participation in the programme

activities, where the number of participants from a given country depends partly on the level of interest

and activity shown by the country's administration in utilizing the potential of the programme. This is

especially true in the case of working visits, which the participating countries initiate and organise

autonomously. In 2015, all the participating countries increased their participation levels, with the

exception of Greece, Croatia and Malta.

4.4

In order for an activity to be organised under the programme, one of the programme teams (participating

country or the EC) has to submit a proposal for this activity, with information on the background, objective,

expected results, participants and financial cost involved. This proposal is then evaluated by TAXUD and,

if confirmed, becomes usually a single joint action. However, in some cases, one proposal can lead to

several joint actions, as is the case for example with multilateral controls. Each proposal is approved for a

certain period of validity during which the associated joint actions are said to be operational, i.e. they can

be organised. The period during which the joint actions are operational can overlap between programme

years.

This is the number of total participants

(which

measures all instances of participation in activities and

allows for the same people to have taken part in multiple activities).

The participants marked as EU represent external experts who come outside national administrations

and who may be invited to contribute to selected activities organised under the programme wherever this

is essential for the achievement of the programme objectives.

Proposals and Actions

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Figure 8: Number of participants per action type in 2015 and the number of operational joint

actions under Fiscalis 2020 in 2015

Number of participants per action

type in 2015

Seminars

Capacity building

Communicaton

MLCs

PAOE

Adm. Coop.

Working visits

Project groups

Workshops

973

144

263

2217

672

Joint Actions operational in 2015

Seminar

Capacity building

Communication

MLCs

PAOE

Adm. Coop.

Working Visits

Project groups

Workshops

113

429

In 2015, there were 710 such operational (ongoing) joint actions. Some of these actions were launched as

new proposals in 2015, while some continued from the programme year 2014. If we look at their

distribution, we can see from the two figures below that the most popular action type remains working

visits, followed by multilateral controls placed second and project groups as distant third. The new type of

joint action introduced under the Fiscalis 2020 programme – Presences in administrative offices /

participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE) - is already widely used, with 49 operational actions in

2015. The situation with regards to the number of participants is somewhat reversed with the project

groups being the largest activity type in terms of participation, followed by workshops and multilateral

controls. The reported number of working visits joint actions is somewhat misleading due to the nature of

the working visit proposals. Working visit proposals are often approved with a longer implementation

period, in order to give time to the hosting and sending administration to find the most suitable moment

and prepare the visit. For this reason, a single working visit action will often cover more than one

programme year. For example, many working visits approved and made operational in the second half of

2015 are only starting to be implemented in 2016. A better indicator of the activity for working visits is the

number of organised events that took place in 2015, which is 199, and the total number of participants to

these visits, which is 263.

During the year, an important groundwork was made for the introduction of another new type of joint

actions - the Expert Teams. This is a new type of a joint collaboration tool which aims at achieving more

efficiently and quickly the intended results with an increased degree of commitment, collaboration and EU

funding. Expert Teams will be especially important for larger projects that require an intensive level of

cooperation and increased funding support. TAXUD in 2015 published a comprehensive guide to EC and

national administrations' programme beneficiaries on how to apply for expert team grants. TAXUD equally

actively assisted the programme beneficiaries in preparing two detailed proposals for expert teams, both

in the area of IT collaboration. They were eventually included for realisation in the 2016 Annual Work

Programme and will be reported on in the next Progress Report.

If we want to look at the evolution of new proposals over time (Figure 9), we first need to exclude the

working visits in order to get a comparative number. This is because in the period before 2014 all the

working visits were covered by a single proposal, while under the Fiscalis 2020 programme each

business case for a working visit is treated as a separate proposal (thus increasing their number by a

significant margin). Comparing the proposals in this way, outside working visits, we can see that their

number was steady in the period 2011-2013. 2014 as the year of transition to the new programme meant

that all proposals for ongoing activities had to be re-launched, which led to the great increase in the

Administrative cooperation actions included in the charts refer to selection meetings in which the

participating countries meet to explore the usefulness of initiating PAOE / MLC actions in a certain area.

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

number of proposals treated in the year. In 2015, we can observe a return to a standard year of activities

under the programme.

Figure 9: Number of new proposals approved under the programme (without working visits)

New proposals approved (without

working visits)

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

At the level of the teams, as expected, most of the proposals for joint actions (other than working visits)

were initiated by DG TAXUD units (marked EU in the Figure 10). The national programme teams mostly

submitted proposals for working visits, and here too we can observe in Figure 10 the difference among

the administrations in the level to which they pro-actively utilise the programme.

Figure 10: Overview of proposals under the programme per initiating country in 2015

Proposals in 2015 by country

3 5 8

2 2

11 6 8

4 2 1 2 8 2 9 1 2 2 4 3 4 6 3 9

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

5.1

PROGRESS IN RELATION TO THE OPERATIONAL OBJECTIVES

Table of indicators

The Performance Measurement Framework contains a list of output and result indicators measuring the

performance across the programme, broken down according to the five operational objectives under the

programme.

The purpose of these indicators, visible in the Figure 12, is to give a meaningful overview of the state of

the performance of programme activities under these operational objectives in the period covered by the

Progress Report.

The indicators for each objective, with some additional information provided, are discussed in separate

chapters that follow.

Figure 11: How to read the indicators table?

How to read the indicators table?

Programme Objective:

mention of the relevant operational objective out of the five operational

objectives of the Fiscalis 2020 programme; in some cases in the beginning of the table there is not

one relevant operational objective as the indicator has a cross-cut programme wide relevance.

Indicators title:

a title given to a group of related indicators for easier reference and understanding

(Sub) indicators:

a description of each individual indicator, often with some additional information on

its measurement.

Type:

describes whether it is an output (O) or a result (R) indicator.

Source:

describes where the data is coming from: PMF surveys, ART (programme management tool

and database) or business units of the European Commission.

Baseline:

where available, the starting measurement against which a progress can be measured. In

the case of data collected with the PMF surveys, this year’s data will serve as the baseline for future

progress reports. For other data, whenever it was possible or meaningful, the last measurements

were used. N/A or 'not available' is mentioned wherever the baseline does not yet exist.

Target:

an ambitious, but achievable goal set for the programmes. Whenever an indicator refers to a

project with an already established target (for example, in the area of IT), this target was used.

Where no prior historical records are available, a stable value or growth was set as the target for this

and next year. After this period, once comparative data for these indicators becomes available, it

might be possible to set numerical targets.

Reference period:

period covered by the indicator. Not to be confused with the timing of the

collection of the data, which can often fall outside this period.

2014/2015 values:

measurements obtained in the reference periods in 2014 and 2015.

Direction:

a simplified system of symbols used to show whether the observed annual trend is in line

with the target, needs additional monitoring or urgent follow-up.

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Figure 12: Fiscalis 2020 indicators at output (O) and result (R) level

Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

Across

all

Collaboration

operational

robustness

objectives

Extent to which the target audience is aware of the

programme

Prog Poll

F2013

Programm

e Poll

(2011)

66.1%

75%

53.89%

Next poll in

2016

Degree of networking generated by programme activities

Q 1: Did the activity provide you a good opportunity to

expand your network of and contacts with officials

abroad? (percentage agreeing)

Q 2: Have you been in contact for work purposes with the

officials you met during this activity since the activity

ended? (percentage agreeing)

Extent to which programme outputs (e.g. guidelines or

training material) are shared within national

administrations

Q 1 (AFF): Were the outputs of the action shared in

national administrations? (percentage agreeing)

Q 2 (EAF): Further to your participation in this activity, did

you share with colleagues what you learned? (percentage

agreeing)

Extent to which JAs (that sought to enhance collaboration

between participating countries, their administrations and

officials in the field of taxation) have achieved their

intended result(s), as reported by action managers:

average score on the scale of 0 (not achieved) to 4 (fully

achieved)

Prog Poll

F2013

Q1:

80%

Q2:

90%

Q1: 91%

Q2: 78.5%

Next poll in

2016

EAF

Q 1: 79%

Q 2: 75%

Q1:

95.15%

Q2: 68%

Q1: 96.5%

Q2: 72.8%







AFF

Q1: 48%

(2014)

Q1: N/A

Q1: 48%

Q1: 63.5%

EAF

Q2: 96%

(Prog Poll

F2013)

Q2:

90%

Q2: 96.4%

Q2: 94.8%

AFF

Work

Visits

2.65

(2014)

3.62

(2014)

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

2.65

3.25

3.62

3.34

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Programme

objective(s)

Operational

objective:

To enhance the

understanding

and

implementation

of Union law in

the field of

taxation

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

The Union Law

and Policy

Application and

Implementation

Extent to which JAs (that sought to enhance the

understanding and implementation of Union law in the

field of taxation) have achieved their intended result(s), as

reported by action managers: average score on the scale

of 0 (not achieved) to 4 (fully achieved)

AFF

Work

Visits

2.66

(2014)

3.53

(2014)

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

2.66

2.87







3.53

3.33

Participants’ views on the extent to which a JA (that

sought to enhance the understanding and implementation

of Union law in the field of taxation) (has) achieved its

intended results (percentage of those who replied 'fully' or

'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the extent to which an event met

their expectations (percentage of those who replied 'fully'

or 'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the usefulness of an event

(percentage of those who replied 'very useful' or 'useful')

Number of actions (JAs) that have supported or facilitated

to enhance the understanding and implementation of

Union law in the field of taxation

Number of recommendations (R) / guidelines (G) / other

outputs (O) issued further to a JA (under this objective)

EAF

93.47%

(2014)

Grow

93.47%

91.62%

EAF

94.5%

(2014)

100%

(2014)

80%

94.5%

92.67%

EAF

80%

100%

ART

46 (2014)

Stable

or grow

AFF

2014:

0 (R)

0 (G)

15 (O)

2014:

1 (R)

0 (G)

8 (O)

99.94%

Grow

0 (R)

0 (G)

15 (O)

11 (R)

0 (G)

6 (O)

AFF

Work

Visits

Grow

1 (R)

0 (G)

8 (O)

23 (R)

9 (G)

56 (O)

Operational

objective:

Availability,

reliability and/or

Availability of CCN overall (%)

98%

99.89%

99.97%

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Programme

objective(s)

To implement,

improve, operate

and support the

European

Information

Systems for

taxation

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

quality of

(specific) Union

components of

EIS and the CCN

Availability of (specific) Union components of EIS during

business hours and otherwise (%)

VIES-on-

the-Web:

99.92%

EMCS:

99.12%

(2014)

VIES-

on-the-

Web

95%

EMCS

97%

VIES-on-

the-Web:

99.92%

EMCS:

99.12%

VIES-on-

the-Web:

99.90%

EMCS:

99.56%



System

performance

Activity indicators

2014

Grow

Over 2.7 stable

billion

message

4.3

Terabyte

applicatio

n data

2.54

(2014)

3.66

(2014)

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

Over 2.7

billion

messages

3.2 billion

4.3

messages

Terabytes

4.7

Terabytes of

applicatio

application

n data

data







Stakeholders’

assessment of

JAs / events

Extent to which JAs (that sought to contribute to the

availability, reliability and/or quality of (specific) Union

components of EIS) have achieved their intended

result(s), as reported by action managers: average score

on the scale of 0 (not achieved) to 4 (fully achieved)

Participants’ views on the extent to which a JA (that

sought to contribute to the availability, reliability and/or

quality of (specific) Union components of EIS) (has)

achieved its intended result(s) (percentage of those who

replied 'fully' or 'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the extent to which an event met

their expectations (percentage of those who replied 'fully'

or 'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the usefulness of an event

(percentage of those who replied 'very useful' or 'useful')

AFF

Work

Visits

2.54

3.44

3.66

3.49

EAF

91.21%

(2014)

Grow

91.21%

97.52%

EAF

92.56%

(2014)

97.3%

(2014)

80%

92.56%

95.87%

EAF

80%

97.3%

99.17%

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Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

New

(components of)

IT systems

indicators

Number of IT projects in phase research

Number of IT projects in the phase development

Number of new IT systems in operation

Ratio of IT projects in status "green"

15 (2014)

9 (2014)

3 (2014)

91.6%

(2014)

20 (2014)

2014:

Excise:31

Tax:3

Excise:116

Tax:56

SLA

provision

N/A

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

91.6%

95%

Existing IT

systems indicator

Number of European Information Systems in operation, as

per Annex 1 of the Fiscalis 2020 Regulation

Number of modifications on IT systems in operation

following:

a) business requests

b) corrections

A) Excise:

Tax: 278

B) Excise:

Tax: 336



N/A

Excise:31

Tax:3

Excise:116

Tax:56

Degree and

quality of support

provided to

Member States

Number of occurrences where the service desk is not

joinable

SLA

provisio

SLA

provisio

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

None







Percentage of service calls answered on time

SLA

provision

2.36

(2014)

3.5

(2014)

98.95%

99.33%

Operational

objective:

To support the

improvement of

administrative

procedures and

the sharing of

good

administrative

practices

Stakeholders’

assessment of

JAs / events

Extent to which JAs (that sought to extend working

practices and/or administrative procedures/guidelines in a

given area to other participating countries) have achieved

their result(s), as reported by action managers: average

score on the scale of 0 (not achieved) to 4 (fully achieved)

Participants’ views on the extent to which a JA (that

sought to extend working practices and/or administrative

procedures/guidelines in a given area to other

participating countries) (has) achieved its intended

AFF

Work

Visits

2.36

3.58

3.50

3.38

EAF

95.26%

(2014)

Grow

95.26%

96.12%

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

result(s) (percentage of those who replied 'fully' or 'to large

extent')

Participants’ views on the extent to which an event met

their expectations (percentage of those who replied 'fully'

or 'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the usefulness of an event

(percentage of those who replied 'very useful' or 'useful')

Number of guidelines and recommendations issued by

participating countries in their national administrations

following programme activities (under this objective)

93.15%

(2014)

96.8%

(2014)

2014:

63 (G)

134 (R)

EAF

80%

93.15%

94.66%















EAF

80%

96.8%

99.03%

EAF

Grow

63 (G)

134 (R)

34 (G)

79 (R)

Best Practices

and Guidelines

Index

Percentage of participants that made use of a working

practice/administrative procedure/guideline

developed/shared with the support of the programme

(under this objective)

Percentage of participants that disseminated a working

practice/administrative procedure/guideline

developed/shared with the support of the programme in

their national administration (under this objective)

Percentage of participants which declare that an

administrative procedure/working practice/guideline

developed/shared under the programme led to a change

in their national administration’s working practices (under

this objective)

Number of actions under the programme organised in this

area

Number of working practices/administrative procedures

(AP) developed/shared (under this objective)

EAF

53%

(2014)

Grow

53%

71.3%

EAF

96.7%

(2014)

Grow

96.70%

94%

EAF

76.31%

(2014)

Grow

76.31%

70.8%

ART

105 (2014)

Stable

or grow

Stable

or grow

Grow or

stable

105

225

AFF

Work

17 (2014)

17 (AP)

7(AP)

18 (2014)

18 (AP)

90 (AP)

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Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

Visits

Indicators on the

simplified

procedures for

the national

administrations

and economic

operators:

Time required to close EMCS movements

8.5 (2013)

12 064

(2015)

8 312 606

(2013)

570 598

165 (2013)

10 892

467

(2013)

270 412

(2013)

Less

7.9 days

8.93 days











Number of registered economic operators in the Mini-One-

Stop-Shop

Number of applications on VAT refund

N/A

12 064

Grow

8 996 154

740 675

627

17 985 065

9 680 576

Number of consultations on VIES-on-the-web

Grow

872 000 000

Number of consultations on SEED-on-Europa

Stable

or Grow

26 025 117

Number of consultations on TEDB

Stable

223 305

232 652

Networking and

cooperation

Number of face to face meetings (total for the Fiscalis

2020 programme)

ART

247 (2014)

Stable

or grow

247

631

Number of on-line collaboration groups (PICS) (total for

the platform)

User

engagement on

PICS

Number of downloaded files from PICS (total for the

platform)

Number of uploaded files on PICS (total for the platform)

(2013)

110

(2013)

13 564

(2013) 3

445

Grow

199

261

Grow

73 200

116 538

11 177

Grow

5 521

Operational

objective:

To reinforce

skills and

competencies of

The Learning

index

Number of EU eLearning modules used by participating

countries (combined number of all modules used in each

country)

Number of times publically available EU eLearning

modules were downloaded from Europa.eu website

60 (2014)

Grow

3609

(2014)

Grow

3609

3564

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Programme

objective(s)

taxation officials

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

Average training quality score by tax officials

67 (2015)

Grow

Stable

or grow

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

Grow

Number of tax officials trained in IT trainings

ART

106 (2014)

87.32%

(2014)

95.77%

(2014)

4 862

(2013)

106

136

Percentage of tax officials who found that the IT training

met their expectations

Percentage of tax officials who found the IT training to be

useful

Number of tax officials trained by using EU common

training material

Number of IT training sessions organised for given

systems / components (e.g. VAT refund, EMCS,VIES,

MOSS )

Number of EU eLearning modules produced

Extent to which JAs (that sought to enhance

administrative cooperation) have achieved their intended

result(s), as reported by action managers: average score

on the scale of 0 (not achieved) to 4 (fully achieved)

EAF

87.32%

93%

EAF

95.77%

98%

4 171

2 700













ART

12 (2014)

Stable

or grow

Grow or

stable

Stable

or grow

Grow or

stable

6 (2013)

2.77

(2014)

Operational

objective:

To support

administrative

cooperation

activities

Stakeholders’

assessment of

JAs / events

AFF

Work

Visits

2.77

3.18

Participants’ views on the extent to which a JA (that

sought to enhance administrative cooperation) (has)

achieved its intended results (percentage of those who

replied 'fully' or 'to large extent')

3.6 (2014)

3.60

3.38

EAF

87.6%

(2014)

Stable

or grow

87.6%

93.13%

The new format of the satisfaction survey was only launched towards the end of 2014. Therefore the data collected in 2014 is insufficient to be representative and

we should rather rely on the 2015 data as the baseline.

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Participants’ views on the extent to which an event met

their expectations (percentage of those who replied 'fully'

or 'to large extent')

Participants’ views on the usefulness of an event

(percentage of those who replied 'very useful' or 'useful')

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

EAF

86.2%

(2014)

95.3%

(2014)

80%

86.2%

93.13%



EAF

80%

95.3%

93.13%

Exchange of

information

Number of e-forms exchanged (within each taxation area:

recovery, VAT; direct taxes)

(2013)

Recovery:

220 005

Direct

taxes:

4 220

Grow or

stable

Recovery:

138 628

Direct

taxes:

1 681

VAT: 56

446

Recovery:

138 679

Direct taxes:

1 627

VAT: 55 895

Number of VIES messages (registry messages)

240 451

922

(2013)

6 428 061

(2013)

12 442

(2013)

49 (2015)

Grow or

Stable

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

Grow or

stable

Grow

235 500 00

304 580

315

7 298 483

Number of messages exchanged on EMCS

6 886 279

Number of EMCS control reports analysed by

documentation or physical controls/findings

Cooperation on

other means of

administrative

cooperation

Number of presences in administrative offices and

participation in administrative enquiries

Number of Member States participating in MLC’s (F2020

data)

Number of Member States initiating MLCs (F2020 data)

ART

15 171

18.149

ART

23 (2014)

23 MS

27 MS

ART

16 (2014)

2.78

(2014)

Grow

16 MS

Degree to which results were achieved, as assessed by

the MLC coordinator

AFF

Grow

2.78

3.08

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Programme

objective(s)

Indicators title

(Sub-) indicators

Type

Source

Baseline

Target

2014 value

2015 value

Direction

EMCS business

statistics

indicators

Administrative Cooperation Common Requests

5 269

(2013)

1 (2013)

3 229

(2013)

Grow

Decrea

5 194

5 441

History Results

Reminder Message for Administrative Cooperation

3 033

Direct

taxation

CLOs:

94.28%

Indirect

taxation

CLOs:

87.8%

3 122









Cooperation via

networks

indicator

The degree to which CLOs assess that the programme

contributed to administrative cooperation

(percentage of them agreeing that the activity

achieved its results)

2014

value

Grow or

stable

97.4%

N/A

Analysis

Number of studies produced (total for the program)

AFF

26 (2014)

Grow or

stable

The indicator in 2015 is consolidated as only one common workshop was held for both CLOs in both direct and indirect taxation.

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5.2

Cross-cut indicators of collaboration robustness between programme stakeholders

The first section of the table of indicators contains a number of programme-wide indicators measuring

awareness, networking, the use of outputs and the achievement of results by the joint actions.

Raising awareness

about the programme and its potential among the target audience is an important

precondition to fulfilling the programme’s objectives. The awareness is measured through the Programme

Poll, which is distributed in all the tax administrations of the participating countries every 18 months. The last

Programme Poll took place between July and September 2015 and close to 4100 tax officials participated.

As the poll measures awareness and networking in the period between the two polls, the results of the 2015

poll were already included and analysed in the 2014 Progress Report. As a reminder, in this report we can

repeat that a drop in awareness could be observed among the tax officials. Slightly over half of them (54%)

were aware of the programme, which represents a drop from 66% who were aware of the programme during

the previous poll in 2011. Although there were external factors influencing this drop in awareness, such as

fewer participants in 2014 and possibly a survey fatigue caused by the introduction of the Performance

Measurement Framework, the Progress Report 2014 recommended to TAXUD to address this drop and take

actions aimed at raising awareness among general tax audience. A communication policy towards the

national stakeholders was identified as a potentially beneficial action in this respect. TAXUD has been

defining in the course of 2016 a new communication plan for the Fiscalis 2020 programme, which includes

the use of new communication tools and channels, as well as a common effort between the EU and national

programme teams in the distribution of information on the programme to the potential beneficiaries. Some of

the actions envisaged under the new communication plan already started to be implemented in 2016.

However, given that the next programme poll is due to take place already at the end of 2016, it is to be seen

whether this poll might come too early for measuring first visible results of the new communication plan.

Networking

is an important by-product of the participation in programme activities. Meeting fellow officials

from other countries and maintaining professional contacts with them facilitates the exchange of best

practices and administrative cooperation. When we compare the replies of participants to programme events

in 2015 to those in 2014, we can observe similar high levels of satisfaction with networking opportunities

provided by programme activities to meet with officials from other countries. Nearly all of the participants

found programme activities to represent a good opportunity to create useful contacts abroad, and there was

a noticeable improvement in 2015 in the number of those who maintained these contacts following the end of

the activity (up by 4%).

We can observe some changes in the levels of sharing of the

programme outputs

(such as

recommendations, guidelines, studies etc.) between 2015 and 2014. Among action managers, there was a

remarkable increase (from 48% to 63.5%) of action managers who reported that the outputs of their actions

were shared in the national administrations. This change is even more impressive when we take into account

the much increased number of actions in 2015 and the high response rate of returned Action Follow up

Forms. It seems that the rise is at least partly influenced by the new type of joint actions – Presences in

administrative offices / participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE) – which had numerous activities in

2015 and among which the sharing of programme outputs nationally is particularly high (77%).

As recommended in the 2014 Progress Report, a more structured and transparent approach to the sharing of

programme outputs would be desirable, since it would both shed more light on the current use of programme

outputs nationally, as well as potentially open up this resource to many more tax officials. Such an approach

would, however, need to address a number of security, privacy and technical challenges involved in such a

larger distribution of outputs, as well as involve a cultural change among the programme stakeholders. Its

success would very much depend on the support and involvement of all programme stakeholders and in

particular of the senior management and the action managers. TAXUD initiated in 2016 discussions on

creating such an approach with the stakeholders and intends to follow them up. However, this should be

seen as a longer term goal that will require gradual change.

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Lastly, in this section we take a general look at the achievement of results as reported by the action

managers of joint actions. The level of achievement of results in 2015 is evaluated on a scale from 0 (not

achieved) to 4 (fully achieved) against the anticipated results at the end of the action. Since most project

groups last for several years, it is to be expected that the level of achievement of results should be below

maximum in this year. In the case of working visits, whose results usually take shorter time to be achieved,

we can expect somewhat higher reported values. When we compare the obtained indicators for 2014 and

2015, we can see that gradual progress is being achieved. The value of 3.25 (increase from 2.65 in 2014) for

joint actions indicates that the action managers are very satisfied with the progress obtained within their

groups in 2015 and that their work is on track toward the planned final results. The participants to joint

actions were equally asked to evaluate the achievement of planned results, and their replies confirm the

situation reported by the action managers. For working visits, the obtained indicator, although slightly

decreased in 2015 (3.34 compared to 3.62 in 2014), is still high value and suggests that these participants

are on average highly satisfied with the business value obtained from the working visits.

5.3

Objective 1: to enhance the understanding and implementation of Union law in the field of

taxation

There were 71

joint actions

operational under this objective in 2015 (an increase from 46 in the previous

year). 55 of the actions were working visits, with Italy, Czech Republic and Turkey being particularly active as

the sending administrations. 7 workshops were organised during the year on a wide range of issues: the

European Semester - Tax Policies for Jobs, Growth and Investment, Definitive VAT Regime for intra-EU

trade, VAT rules for passenger transport, EMCS, taxation issues surrounding Partially denatured alcohol

(PDA) and a workshop on taxation of energy products and electricity used in mineralogical and metallurgical

processes. A seminar on modernising VAT for cross-border e-commerce was equally organised under this

objective.

The Union Law and Policy Application and Implementation Index

provides a comprehensive overview of the

performance of the joint actions organised under this objective. The main indicator relates to the level of

achievement of expected results, as they were identified prior to the activity and later evaluated by their

action managers. The obtained value of 2.87 (up from 2.66 in 2014) indicates that the action managers are

satisfied with the progress obtained within their groups in 2015. Such a positive assessment is also

confirmed by the participants to joint actions, who have also expressed very high levels of satisfaction with

the activities in terms of ‘meeting their expectations’, although the value has slightly decreased compared to

2014. The number of officials participating to these activities who found them to be professionally 'useful' or

'very useful' has remained in both years at the remarkable 100%. The working visits organised under this

objective have also been assessed very positively with 3.33 (down from 3.53 in 2014) by their participants.

The output indicators included in this group relate to the number of recommendations, guidelines and other

types of outputs produced by the joint actions organised under this objective. We can see some

improvement in this indicator, in 2015, we had 34 recommendations, 9 guidelines and 62 other types of

outputs (such as studies, reports and presentations) produced. As a comparison in 2014, we had only one

recommendation reported (which was issued as a follow up to a working visit), no guidelines and in total 23

other types of outputs.

5.4

Objective 2: to implement, improve, operate and support the European Information Systems

for taxation

The great majority of the programme funding is spent on the

European Information Systems,

which are of

critical importance for interconnecting the tax authorities effectively. The list of the existing EIS is included in

the Annex of the Fiscalis 2020 Regulation.

The first indicator in this section looks at

CCN/CSI (common communication network/common systems

interface in the area of taxation and customs), which offers

all national administrations a coherent, robust

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and secure method of access to the EIS. The CCN target says the network should be available 98% of the

time. We can observe that this target was surpassed in 2015, as was the case in 2014. The availability of the

specific Union components of the EIS, namely the taxation's main operation application VIES-on-the-Web

and the excise's main operation application EMCS, also surpassed its target and maintained its performance

as compared to the previous year.

The general system activity indicator tells us more on the overall use of the network. Over 3.217 billion

messages and 4.7 Terabytes of application data were exchanged via the network in 2015, which represents

an increase of 20% in the number of messages and 9% in the size of data exchanged over 2014. The traffic

increase in 2015 is mainly attributed to the recently introduced applications in production, such as MOSS

(Taxation) COPIS link to the Enforcement Database of EUIPO (Customs), as well as European statistical

data exchange network - ESDEN (EuroSTAT). At the same time, the number of hits on the applications

available via the public Europa Internet Access were 97.53 Million (33% increase over 2014).

For the existing EIS applications, we can see that 21 of them were up and running in 2015 (compared to 20

in 2014). Regular check-ups and updates were performed on them throughout the year, with 308 business

evolutive changes (up from 34 in 2014) and 417 corrective changes (up from 172) taking place. We can also

observe that the service desk was performing well and in line with the Service Level Agreements with nearly

all the calls (99.33%) answered on time.

DG TAXUD's IT Work Plan lists a number of IT projects linked to new developments in several tax areas. At

the level of the output indicators, we can see that one new IT system was developed in 2015 - the AEOI

DAC1 which developed the electronic formats (XML schemes) to exchange information in the area of direct

taxation between tax administrations. The AEOI DAC1 System was fully deployed and the first exchanges

have taken place in June 2015. No major issues were encountered. Collected and analysed operational

statistics for AEOI – DAC1, showed performance fully in-line with the capacity plan. A total number of 1,963

messages were exchanged by the Member States with top performers to be MSA-DE (398), MSA -NL (208)

and MSA -AT (198). BE, DE, IT and NL were the Member States that exchanged the largest Total Messages

Size (52.00 MB, 173.20 MB, 124.01 MB and 68.14 MB respectively).

Another 7 new IT projects entered the development phase (down from 9 last year) and 14 entered the

research phase (down from 15 in 2014). 20 out of these 21 IT projects were in the status 'green', meaning

they were progressing in line with the requirements, time and budget limitations. The only project suffering a

delay was TIN – whose aim is to explore the possibility of creating a Tax Identification Number that would be

allocated to all taxpayers, natural persons or companies that engage in a cross-border activity. Due to the

important workload in the managing unit, the contract for this project has been extended and the work

spread over 6 additional months, until the end of 2016.

At the level of

joint actions

that were organised in relation to the EIS, these were mostly project groups and

workshops. The project groups included the IT Collaboration Catalyst Group, the IT Architecture group, the

IT Valuation group, the AEOI Statistics group, the group on Enhanced test material framework for Tax

European Information Systems, the group on Implementation Plan for Expert Team of managed IT

Collaboration and the group on Implementation Plan of AEOI DAC2 modules. A workshop was organised on

AEOI DAC2 IT collaborative implementation. The stakeholders’ assessment of these actions was positive

and above the average assessment provided under the programme.

5.5

Objective 3: to support the improvement of administrative procedures and the sharing of good

administrative practices

The improvement of administrative procedures and the sharing of good administrative practices take place at

several levels in the programme. It is done through joint actions, European Information Systems and the

online collaboration platform PICS.

We can see a great increase in the number of

joint actions

operational under this objective. Their number

more than doubled with 225 JA's operational in 2015 (compared to 105 in 2014). Again, the vast majority of

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actions organised were working visits (199), with the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Spain and Estonia

being particularly proactive as sending organisations. Two new capacity building initiatives were launched

under this objective in 2015, concerning technical assistance to tax administrations in Lithuania and

Romania, but the activities are still to take place. Six new project groups were equally started during the year

on the following topics: Automatic Exchange of Information between the EU member States and its effects,

Cloud computing, Segmentation and Behavioural Profiling of taxpayers, technical implementation of VAT

refund, and two groups dedicated to the E-audit platform.

The indicators measuring the direct and indirect outputs of the joint actions organised under this objective

fluctuated greatly between the two years. In 2015, there were 97 best working practices and administrative

procedures developed and shared at the European level (as reported by action managers and working visit

participants), compared to only 35 such outputs in 2014. On the other hand, the participants to these joint

actions reported that their national administrations have issued 34 guidelines and 79 recommendations

further to these programme activities, which is nearly half the numbers reported in 2014. The values of these

indicators are influenced not only by the type and number of joint actions organised in the year (which in

itself can change greatly between the years), but also by the sample of participants which responded to the

survey. While this limitation makes it difficult to place any concrete targets for these indicators, they remain

informative as they provide some insight into the outputs of these joint actions and their follow up at the

national level. Further years of measurement might provide more clarity when it comes to the interpretation

of these indicators.

Besides measuring the number of outputs, we also look at their dissemination and use in the national

administrations. The dissemination of programme outputs by the participants is slightly down by 2%, but still

high, with 94% of the participants declaring to have distributed programme outputs nationally. The use of

these outputs nationally has risen significantly, from 53% to 71.3%. In the 2015 EAF survey, a new question

was added making the question on the use of the outputs in national administrations more precise, which

may account partially for this difference. We also asked the participants whether these outputs have led to

any change in the national administrations' working practices, and here 71% (down by 5%) answered

positively, citing one or more of the following changes in the national administrations: increased knowledge

of colleagues, improved working practices/administrative procedures and improved tools. Again, an

additional year of measurement will help understand better the trends in these values.

A number of key

European Information Systems

are used by economic operators for simplified

administrative procedures. The obtained indicators suggest that these systems are being used and that the

programme has on the whole simplified procedures for more economic operators than previously.



The

VIES-on-the Web

is an internet tool offered by DG TAXUD to enhance access by taxable

persons making intra-Community supplies to verification of their customers' VAT identification

numbers. The consultation of VIES-on-the-Web has been growing consistently for many years, as

seen by the data. In the last two years, the number of consultations grew by over 50% in total. This

big increase has been realised thanks to the continuous update of VIES-on-the-Web application,

which increases the system's robustness. Evidence shows that the system is increasingly used for

real-time validations for e-commerce transactions.

The total average response time required to close

EMCS movements

(from the movement initiation

messages to their corresponding Report of Receipt) increased from 7.9 days in 2014 to 8.93 days in

2015. The total average response time was stable during 2015 with two exceptions observed in April

2015 and in October 2015 when the total average response time increased to 14.70 and 13.60 days

respectively. The increased values were caused due to movements closed by: MSA-Portugal with

average response time 276.4 days. 41.6% report of receipts sent by MSA-Portugal to MSA-Spain in

April 2015 concerning movements received from 2011 to 2014; and MSA-Netherlands with average

response time 84.00 days. A high number of movements that were dispatched from MSA-France

during the period 2011 – 2014 were closed by MSA-Netherlands in November 2015.



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

The

VAT Refund

system has experienced a solid increase, with close to 9.7 million messages

exchanged annually, and continues to grow over the last two years by 7.5% on average. The table

below summarises the message evolution per Member State Administration.

Figure 13: VAT Refund Message Evolution per Member State Administration in 2015



There is a significant increase of hits on

SEED-on-Europa

during the last twenty-four months. An

increase of 44.70% is observed during 2015 compared to 2014.

The

Taxes in Europe database

(TEDB) is the European Commission's on-line information tool

covering the main taxes in force in the EU Member States. Over the years, there has been a steady

decrease in the number of page views (2012: 313 000, 2013: 270 000, 2014: 220 000). However, in

2015 the trend has slightly reversed and the number of visits is now at 232 652. DG TAXUD is at the

moment upgrading the system and the new TEDBv3 release should become available in 2016. It will

offer much more possibilities for exploitation of the information in the database for both TAXUD and

the internet users.

The

Mini-One-Stop Shop

(MOSS) system became operational on 1 January 2015 and in this report

we can include for the first time the relevant indicator. The number of registered traders by the end of

2015 for the Union scheme was 11 254 and for the non-Union scheme 810, or in total 12 064. The

breakdown per country can be seen in the table below.



Figure 14: Registrations of traders in the Mini-One-Stop Shop IT system in 2015

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In the area of

online collaboration,

we are looking at the use of the Programme Information and

Collaboration Space - PICS. This platform is used by many DG TAXUD and national customs officials to

facilitate the running of joint actions, but also for other, non-programme related collaboration needs. We can

see that the total number of online collaboration groups (both customs and tax) on the platform has

continued to rise during 2015, increasing from 199 to 261, or on average, five new online collaboration

groups created every month of the year. Similarly, the number of active users (users who have used PICS in

the last six months) has increased from roughly 2400 at the end of 2014 to over 3100 at the end of 2015, or

on average 2 new active users signing up every day. Not all users and groups have classified themselves,

but from those that have, we know that the ratio between customs and tax users on the platform is roughly

evenly split. In terms of usage of the platform, on average there were 320 new content items and 170

comments published every month by users. In terms of file sharing, there was a general increase of 60% in

the number of downloaded files, and a 100% increase in the number of uploaded files across the platform.

This increase can be also partially attributed to the improvements done to the documents management

functionality on the platform in 2015.

A number of evolutive changes and improvements were made on the platform in 2015 (and in early 2016).

Perhaps the most interesting ones concern the introduction of taxonomy (a new system of categorising

groups and users) which now includes specific customs and tax, as well as common categories. PICS online

groups can now also be linked by financial code with the Activity Reporting Tool used for managing the

programme actions and events. This is a first step in eventual closer integration of the two systems. PICS

was also enabled in 2015 to play video files, which has already been used in a number of groups for

distributing webinars and learning courses. Finally, a number of improvements were made to facilitate the

use of PICS by group leaders in combination with audio-visual tools for scheduling and running online

meetings with their group members. This is part of the new approach to the development of PICS, which

besides own development of functionalities includes also a promotion of combined usage of PICS with other

more specialised tools. TAXUD has also increased user support during 2015 by providing a number of

training videos, help articles and live coaching sessions.

5.6

Objective 4: to reinforce skills and competencies of taxation officials

Under this objective, we are measuring indicators related to the use of the different types of training activities

provided under the programme: the e-Learning courses and the IT trainings for European taxation IT

systems. There are also other types of activities with a learning dimension organised under the programme,

such as seminars, workshops and working visits. However, they are assessed in relation to their primary

business objective and reported on in other chapters.

The Fiscalis 2020 programme finances the development of

eLearning courses

on topics of common

interest in collaboration with tax administrations and representatives of trade. Such courses support the

implementation of EU legislation and ensure the dissemination of good taxation practices throughout the

European Union. During 2015, there were no new releases, but important update was done on 12 courses

on the VAT Directive, which were released in 2016 in 15 languages. This VAT eLearning programme

consists of 12 individual courses each lasting on average about 30 minutes: VAT Introduction, VAT Territory,

VAT Taxable Person, VAT Transaction, VAT Place of Taxable Transactions, VAT Digital Services and

MOSS, VAT Chargeable Event and taxable Amount, VAT rates, VAT Exemptions, VAT Right to Deduct, VAT

Refund and VAT Obligations.

In 2015, the combined number of various eLearning courses used by the participating countries was 62, or

higher by 2 than in 2014. This indicator is obtained by adding together the number of courses used in each

country. The most popular eLearning courses in 2015 remained the same as in 2014: the VAT Directive

version 2.1 (used by 17 countries), VAT Fraud (used by 17 countries) and VAT Refund (used by 13

countries). According to the present monitoring data, approximately 2700 officials were trained in 2015 using

common training material of the Union. If confirmed once the data is finalised, this would represent a

significant drop compared with the 2014 number (4117). However, one should bear in mind that since there

were no new releases of courses in 2014 and 2015, it is possible that the interest for the trainings with the

existing courses has fallen. The release of 12 new courses in 2016 should reverse this trend.

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The tax officials were asked to report back on the quality of the training courses using the internationally

recognised Kirkpatrick training scale

. The trainees were requested to score, on a scale of 100 points, the

relevance of the courses, the achievement of their learning objectives, the learning retention and the ‘user-

friendliness’ of the course. We can see that the average score in 2015 measured 67 points, which is a drop

from 73 points measured in the previous year. However, the new format of the satisfaction survey was only

launched towards the end of 2014. Therefore the data collected in 2014 is insufficient to be representative

and we should rather rely on the 2015 data as the baseline. The 2015 data on the other hand seems to well

reflect the user satisfaction with currently available EU eLearning courses in general. It should also be noted

that the 2014 published courses are showing effect only in 2015, and the users' feedback may reflect

predominately the reaction to the 2014 released course, which were not ‘new’ eLearning courses but

updates of the existing eLearning courses.

In 2015, there were also 21

IT training sessions

(increase from 12 in 2014) organised by DG TAXUD for

national tax officials on how to use various European tax and excise IT Systems, such as: CCN CSI, CCN2,

EMCS Phase 3.2 and Excise BPM. Special training sessions were also organised on how to use the Activity

Reporting Tool (ART), which is used in the management of Fiscalis 2020. In total, 136 (up from 106 in the

previous year) national tax officials were trained in these sessions, which received very positive feedback

from the participants in terms of their usefulness and meeting the participants’ expectations.

5.7

Objective 5: to support administrative cooperation activities

Under this objective, we look at the different activities that supported administrative cooperation between

national tax authorities. Administrative cooperation is of vital importance as no single Member State can

manage its internal taxation system without receiving information from other Member States. Administrative

cooperation is facilitated by both joint actions and European Information Systems.

In total, there were 269

joint actions

organised under this objective, which is an increase from 166 in 2014.

The most numerous actions were multilateral controls (113), followed by the working visits (70), PAOE (49),

project groups (17), administrative cooperation activities (13) and workshops (7). The assessment of action

managers indicates achieved progress compared to the previous year, with the value up from 2.77 to 3.18 in

2015. Among the working visits, we can observe a small downward fluctuation, from 3.60 to 3.38. The

participants' feedback on the 'achievement of results' and 'met expectations' is high and has risen year on

year by average 6%, while the perceived usefulness is equally high and has only slightly decreased by 2% to

93%.

The most numerous joint actions were the

multilateral controls.

Multilateral control means a co-ordinated

control of the tax liability of one or more related taxable persons, organised by two or more participating

countries, which include at least one Member State and which have common or complementary interests.

The Fiscalis 2020 programme supports the MLCs by providing an organisational, methodological and

financial framework for their implementation as it allows having preparatory and follow-up meetings under the

programme which allow coordinating the actual audits which are carried out by national officials on their own

territory.

In 2015, 27 Member States participated in such multilateral controls, which is 4 more than in 2014 (only

Malta did not participate in an MLC). At the same time, 19 Member States initiated MLCs, in varying numbers

(see figure 15), which represents an increase from 2014 when 16 Member States initiated such actions.

http://www.wa.gov/esd/training/toolbox/tg_kirkpatrick.htm

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Figure 15: Multilateral controls initiated by country in 2015 (countries not shown had zero)

Initiated MLCs by country in 2015

RO SE

GB HU

The action managers of the multilateral controls that took place in 2015 have expressed a very positive

assessment regarding the level of achievement of results (3.11), which is higher than the same value

measured in 2014 (2.78).

As opposed to multilateral controls, which were included in the previous generation of the programme, the

Fiscalis 2020 programme introduces a new category of joint actions aimed at supporting administrative

cooperation. This new category of joint actions refers to the

presences in administrative offices and

participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE).

In practice this means that the tax inspectors from one

Member State can be present in another Member State when colleagues from this other Member State carry

out their duties in administrative offices or during administrative enquiries. This can be extremely useful, in

particular where there are indications of irregularities or large-scale cross-border fraud in one or more

Member States; in cases whose complexity makes the presence of officials desirable; or in cases for which

the prescription period is due to expire and where the presence of officials can speed up the enquiry. There

were 49 such actions launched in 2015. Many of them were used by Finland and Estonia. Finland has

launched 24 PAOE joint actions to visit Estonia to investigate different establishment cases. Many Estonian

companies have a lot of business activities in Finland with often the owners and/or the management being

Finns. The common question is whether or not the company has a permanent establishment in Finland, but

the main problem is how to collect information for the decision making process. Finland has decided to use

the PAOE tool effectively and to send to Estonia for PAOE tax officials specialized in permanent

establishment issues. Similarly, the UK tax administration launched 9 PAOE visits to their Irish colleagues,

on a variety of topics, from completing audits and VAT inspections to supporting the business risk review

process.

An important role in administrative cooperation and mutual assistance between tax authorities is played by

the national

Central Liaison Offices

(CLOs). The Fiscalis 2020 programme supports meetings and

workshops of Heads of CLOs in the fields of direct and indirect taxation. While, in previous years there were

two workshops organized separately for Heads of CLOs in the direct and indirect taxation, one combined

workshop was held in September 2015 following previous recommendations expressed by participants. The

Heads of CLOs have given a very positive feedback on this combined workshop. Their satisfaction is overall

higher than the last year, with nearly all of them, 97.4% saying that the activity achieved its results and that it

met their expectations, and virtually all of them (100%) found it to be useful or very useful professionally.

Their qualitative feedback was reflecting this high satisfaction, with many participants saying it was a useful

opportunity that gave them a wider perspective, ensured better liaison between CLOs and allowed some

bilateral issues to be resolved face to face.

Another important way of enhancing the administrative cooperation between tax authorities is through the

Excise Movement and Control System (EMCS)

- a computerised system for monitoring the movement of

excise goods under duty suspension in the EU. It records, in real-time, the movement of alcohol, tobacco

and energy products for which excise duties have still to be paid. More than 80 000 economic operators

currently use the system, and it is a crucial tool for information exchange and cooperation between Member

States. At the level of indicators, if we compare the values from baseline in 2013 till the last measurement in

2015 we can see that the number of messages exchanged on EMCS continues to grow by roughly the same

percentage every year (7%), while the amount of EMCS control reports analysed by documentation or

physical controls/findings grows by an even larger margin (20%). Administrative Cooperation Common

Requests grew by 5% from 2014 till 2015. These requests are used to request information about movements

and / or individual traders, as well as access to archived messages held in another Member State. The

History Results indicator measures the number of times when the information requested was not found, and

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this indicator has remained largely stable in the last two years. Finally, there has been a slight increase (3%)

in the number of Reminder Messages for Administrative Cooperation, but this value still remains below the

baseline measured in 2013.

In the area of

e-Forms exchanged

(number of messages exchanged via the Taxation mailboxes on CCN),

the numbers of these messages for direct taxation and recovery remained at same levels between 2015 and

2014. This is equally true for other types of taxation mailboxes (MOSS, MLC, Fraud, SEED etc.), where it is

observed that there is no specific trend or a recognizable pattern regarding the way that messages fluctuate

over time.

When it comes to the

VAT Information Exchange Systems (VIES),

during the reporting period, we could

observe an increase in the number of Registry messages of nearly 30%. If we look at the total number of

various types of VIES messages (Registry, TOD, MSW), it reached the number of 656,094,014. Compared

to 2014 (514,383,489 messages in the period) they were significantly increased by 27.55%. The total

number of VIES messages including those from VIES on the Web reached the number of 1,702,562,060,

increased by 19.45% in comparison to 1,425,297,752 in 2014.

Figure 16: Evolution of VIES Messages per Message Type (Q1/2014 to Q4/2015)

Abbreviations on the chart stand for: Turnover Data – TOD, Member State Warning - MSW and Vies-on

the Web – VoW messages

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6.1

PROGRESS IN RELATION TO THE ANNUAL WORK PROGRAMME

Introduction

The Annual Work Programme (AWP) is a strategic and budgetary frame for the setting up of individual

actions to be financed by the Fiscalis 2020 programme. The Fiscalis 2020 Committee provides its formal

opinion on the AWP before its adoption by the Commission.

The core part of the AWP consists of several projects, which are grouped in function of the Fiscalis 2020

programme's specific objective area to which they will mainly contribute. All activities under the programme

are organised to support the achievement of the objectives of these projects. The list of AWP projects is

drawn up by DG TAXUD and the participating countries by taking into consideration the EU's policy priorities

in the area of taxation.

The 2015 AWP consisted of 29 projects. In the chapter below, we have included one case study for each

relevant part of the specific objective of the programme, or 5 AWP projects in total, with additional

information on their work and outcomes during 2015. This information was provided by the action managers

who organised some of the activities under those projects. While the activities listed under the projects

include only those actions initiated in 2015, the summaries of main outcomes include sometimes information

on related actions initiated in previous years, but which continued during 2015.

6.2

Part 1 – To support the fight against tax fraud, tax evasion and aggressive tax planning - Case

Study

Specific objective:

Support the fight against tax fraud, tax evasion and aggressive tax planning

Title of the AWP Project:

Cooperation between customs and tax administrations

Description of the project:

The cooperation between tax and customs authorities in specific areas of mutual concern should be

enhanced to ensure compliance, to fight against tax fraud and to facilitate legitimate trade.

In the Communication on the future of VAT (COM/2011/851), the Commission noted that it "will

initiate and facilitate initiatives for a stronger cooperation between tax and customs authorities". In its

Communication to the European Parliament and the Council on an action plan to strengthen the fight

against tax fraud and tax evasion (COM(2012) 722 final), the Commission calls for structured

exchanges of information between the tax and customs administrations on the strategies to identify

non-compliance and foresees the development of a common methodology and guidelines to improve

access to information on money flows by tax administrations. The European Court of Auditors also

issued recommendations on the misuse of the customs 4200 procedure.

Actions initiated under the programme in 2015:

Project groups:



Joint Fiscalis 2020 and Customs 2020 project group on Coordination of Excise and

Customs Procedures (FPG/002, CPG/003)

Project group to Enhance the cooperation between customs and tax administrations

including information exchange (FPG/010)

Working visits:

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

Working visit on exemption procedures for VAT and excise to Bulgaria by one German tax

official (FWV/032)

Working visit on tax payers' inspection and control to Austria by one Dutch tax inspector

by (FWV/143)

Working visit on exemptions of VAT and excise duty on tobacco products to Austria by two

Spanish tax officials (FWV/227)

Working visit on excise duties and VAT to Sweden by three Spanish tax auditors

(FWV/238)

Four working visits on new methods of cooperation between authorities fighting tax fraud

to Cyprus, Estonia and Slovenia by three Hungarian tax officials (FWV/269)

Working visits on development of anti-fraud system to Romania by three Danish tax

officials (FWV/401)

Expected results and their level of achievement:

Fields where cooperation between customs and tax authorities is Partially achieved

particularly important for the proper implementation of customs,

excise, direct taxes and VAT legislation are identified.

Best practices related to methods and tools used by Member States Partially achieved

to analyse risk in the field of fraud related to VAT/Customs and

regarding new trends of fraud in the field of VAT/Customs are

identified.

A series of recommendations to be approved by the Indirect Tax Ongoing

Expert Group (ITEG) and the Customs Code Committee concerning

the application of Union law to excise goods in both areas is

developed.

Proposals for efficient methods to enhance the cooperation between Partially achieved

customs and tax administration including information exchange,

including in the area of cash controls and customs procedure 4200,

are developed.

Business process models are provided to describe the processes Achieved

contained in legislation, to clarify and explain the legal base for

excise and customs procedures: specification work on modelling of

interface between Excise Movement and Control System (EMCS)

and UCC version of Automatic Export System (AES) and national

import systems.

The European Information Systems responsible for the movements Ongoing

of excise goods are updated to coincide with the UCC import

specification and the AES.

VAT and excise related competency requirement is analysed to Partially achieved

complete the EU Customs Competency Framework.

Tax and customs-related e-Government services are promoted.

EMCS eLearning modules are updated.

Summary of main outcomes:

The Fiscalis 2020 and Customs 2020 programmes are used to support both customs and tax

administrations in this task. Namely, to identify the connection points between both for specific

transactions and to define good practices for the division of tasks and sharing of information.

In 2015, the programme funding was used to set up a group of experts from Member States to

Postponed

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prepare a report on enhancing the cooperation between customs and tax administrations. The report

of this project group (FPG/010) focuses on cross cutting issues where a good cooperation between

these two administrations is necessary for the correct application of the legislation and it promotes

good practices for such cooperation already existing in several Member States. The report is only

available to the relevant expert group, since it contains sensitive information on how fraudsters

abuse the system based on the experience of national experts. The report was presented to all

Member States to attract their attention to the importance of this subject and will be taken into

account for future work of the Commission in this field.

As regards the joint Fiscalis 2020 and Customs 2020 project group on Coordination of Excise and

Customs Procedures (FPG 002 / CPG 003):

1. Work on harmonisation of export and excise procedures is complete. On the technical side

results are being fed into the specifications of AES and of a future release of EMCS. The

proposed changes will form one of the areas of investigation for an Impact Analysis for

changes to the Directive 2008/118/EC.

2. Work on the handover from customs control at the release for free circulation (importation)

to excise procedures has begun and will continue in a new import project group.

3. Widespread use of transit procedures for the supervision of the movement of excise goods

has been investigated during this project. Clarification of the legal base and the technical

needs for these arrangements will be the task of a further new project group, along with the

use of other special procedures.

4. Arrangements for centralised clearance of excise goods were examined during this project.

This work may also be followed by a new project group

5. The initiation of these new project groups will be on the basis of the importance and urgency

of the issues raised and available resources.

6.3

Part 2 – To support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by securing

exchange of information - Case Study

Specific objective:

Support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by securing

exchange of information

Title of the AWP Project:

IT collaboration

Description of the project:

Currently, the tax European Information Systems are all too often developed in isolation both from a

geographical and reusability perspective. This risk impairs the capacity of IT to deliver in years to

come. Closer collaboration across taxation domains and across Member States is expected to

merge requirements and expertise and thereby significantly increase cost-effectiveness of tax EIS. A

managed IT collaboration will allow increasing the number of shared IT activities between the

Member States as well as increasing the number of reusable components across the taxation silos.

This will reduce the costs for IT implementation, deployment and operation in the Member States

while offering increased agility in responding to the EU policy expectation.

The Commission will initiate and trigger all the IT collaboration initiatives in a managed way, and act

as a catalyst to make the managed IT collaboration happen in an effective and efficient manner.

Actions initiated under the programme in 2015:

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Project groups:



IT Collaboration Catalyst Group (FPG/037)

IT Architecture Group (FPG/039)

IT Valuation Group (FPG/040)

Enhanced test material framework for Tax European Information Systems (FPG/052)

AEOI Statistics (FPG/053)

Automatic management of guarantees for movements of excise goods under duty

suspension (FPG/057)

Implementation Plan of AEOI DAC2 modules (FPG/063)

Workshop:



Workshop on AEOI DAC2 IT collaborative implementation (FWS/051)

Expected results and their level of achievement:

Efficient and effective IT collaboration, in particular by defining Achieved

the lifecycle of the IT collaborative domain, developing a master

plan, an IT valuation methodology, an IT collaboration

communication plan and IT architecture.

The use of the IT collaboration platform is enhanced.

Summary of main outcomes:

The IT Collaboration Catalyst group (FPG/037) - constituted by 15 Member States - provided a

framework for IT collaboration which allows for organising a managed and structured IT

collaboration among Member States for developing IT systems and solutions. The framework

depicts the life cycle of IT collaboration, the principles and the governance guidelines. The Catalyst

group also finalized the structure of the Taxation Strategic Overview, which includes EU and national

IT projects with potential for IT Collaboration.

Simultaneously, the Communication Plan for the IT Collaboration initiatives was implemented - the

first newsletter was sent in June 2015 to over 350 stakeholders and the second newsletter was sent

in September 2015 to over 400 stakeholders from among the Member States and the European

Commission.

Moreover, IT architecture was developed (under FPG/039 project group) representing a reference

document for the IT experts willing to collaborate in a common manner since it contains, inter alia,

recommended IT standards, agreed terminology and technical references.

The IT valuation methodology (under FPG/040 project group) was also finalised: the methodology

sets up the basic principles for identifying and assessing potential IT collaboration projects with

costs and benefits analysis approach, and it is supported by a specific IT tool created by the same

group.

Furthermore, in 2015, the first new projects for collaboration were launched and obtained the first

concrete results:



Automatic exchange of information (AEOI) - Directive for Administrative Cooperation (DAC1)

Statistics - under FPG/053 - The AEOI Statistics Module was created collaboratively among

the six Member States through the phases of Design (UK leading), Software development (SE

and RO) and Testing (FI, UK, IT and MT), with MT providing Project Management and

infrastructure. The final Software package was successfully delivered in September, and made

available to all Member States: it was published in PICS, together with all the required

documentation, and 13 additional Member States asked access to download and use the

application. The six Member States participating to the project group have estimated a total

Achieved

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savings of more than 600k €. In 2016, the group is going to develop a second solution for the

AEOI Statistics Module based on .NET platform, with MT as software developer.



The FPG/052 Enhanced Test material framework project group has created the framework

for improving testing and a user guide for using and producing such enhanced test material to

be stored in a new repository in PICS. The new repository will be available in 2016, as well as

the final release of the framework. First tests of the group already showed the added value of

using such enhanced test material by detecting some errors that could have resulted in

production costs.

A new project group was also launched in 2015 among 17 Member States for the Automatic

Management of the Excise Guarantees (FPG/057): the main objective is to define the specifications

for an automatic management system for the guarantees of excise goods movements and the

requirements for an EU database of excise rates.

A workshop was held in Malta in December of 2015 where discussions took place concerning the

technical specifications of DAC2 and IT Collaboration among the Member States: 39 representatives

from 23 MS and one OECD representative participated and identified a number of potential DAC2

modules to be developed in IT Collaboration through the Fiscalis 2020 expert teams.

Due to the success of the above IT Collaboration initiatives, Member States have agreed to launch

two Fiscalis 2020 expert teams in 2016 to develop AEOI DAC2 national modules and to assure the

governance of managed IT Collaboration activities, respectively.

6.4

Part 3 – To Support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by supporting

administrative cooperation - Case Study

Specific objective:

Support the implementation of Union law in the field of taxation by supporting

administrative cooperation

Title of the AWP Project:

Administrative cooperation between Member States

Description of the project:

The Commission is assisting Member States in their efforts to engage in effective administrative

cooperation by providing them with the practical tools and instruments they need (for example

electronic formats for exchange of information and secure channels of communication).

The administrative cooperation between Member States has to be further supported and enhanced

by reinforcing skills and competences of tax officials, supporting the improvement of administrative

procedures and sharing of good administrative practices, enhancing the understanding and

implementation of Union law in the area or, for example, by improving the use of existing instruments

for exchange of information and develop new ones according to the legislation or promoting the most

effective use of practical IT tools. The effective and comprehensive use by Member States of these

tools, instruments and practices is still to be evaluated and enhanced.

Actions initiated under the programme in 2015

Multilateral Controls (MLC) and Presences in administrative offices and participation in administrative

enquiries (PAOE) represent by their nature examples of administrative cooperation between Member States.

Some activities listed below were assigned to other AWP projects, based on the subject matter of the

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

Presences in administrative offices and participation in administrative enquiries:



Presences in administrative offices in the field of distribution of goods to Ireland by one UK

experts (FAP/001)

Two presences in administrative offices in the field of oils to Ireland by five UK experts

(FAP/002, FAP/021)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of outsourcing of buying of raw materials to

Austria by three German officials (FAP/003)

23 presences in administrative offices in the field of construction to Estonia by 23 Finnish

tax experts (FAP/004-007, FAP/011-012, FAP/015-016, FAP/040-053)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of consumer goods to Estonia by three

Latvian tax auditors (FAP/009)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of support services to Ireland by one UK tax

auditors (FAP/010)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of licence fees to Austria by two German tax

experts (FAP/017)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of profit allocation to Austria by two German

tax experts (FAP/018)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of service deliveries to Ireland by one UK tax

expert (FAP/019)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of metal sector to Finland by two Swedish

auditors (FAP/020)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of oils to Ireland by two UK auditors

(FAP/021)

2 presences in administrative offices in the field of consumer goods to Ireland by two UK

auditors (FAP/022, FAP/039)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of drinks to Ireland by two UK auditors

(FAP/023)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of restaurant/leisure sector to Ireland by one

UK auditor (FAP/031)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of banking sector to the Netherlands by two

Belgian auditors (FAP/032)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of financial services to Sweden by three

Finnish auditors (FAP/033)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of production and trade of biological food to

Austria by two German auditors (FAP/034)

Presences in administrative offices in production and trade of bio food and beverages to

Austria by two German auditors (FAP/036) – cancelled

Presences in administrative offices in the field of financial services to Cyprus by two

Swedish auditors (FAP/037)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of transfer pricing to Germany by three Dutch

auditors (FAP/038)

particular MLC or PAOE, but are nevertheless included in this overview to give a complete impression of the

administrative cooperation activities.

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

Presences in administrative offices in the field of consumer goods to Ireland by one UK

auditor (FAP/039)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of cross-border transactions to Cyprus by two

Belgian auditors (FAP/054)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of financial services to Germany by two

Dutch auditors (FAP/055)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of construction to Lithuania by two Latvian

auditors (FAP/056)

Presences in administrative offices in the field of agricultural products to Lithuania by three

Latvian auditors (FAP/057)

Multilateral controls:



Multilateral control on football (FMC/001)

Multilateral control on fur trade (FMC/002)

Multilateral control on cross border business (FMC/004)

Multilateral control on Supply of mineral oil (fuel oil / gas oil) on board of vessels (FMC/006)

Multilateral control on VAT fraud (FMC/013)

Multilateral control on bets and EDP services (FMC/015)

Multilateral control on the employment of construction workers via a foreign employment

agency (FMC/017)

Multilateral control on cross border labour in the construction sector (FMC/021)

Multilateral control on avoidance of VAT and excise with warehousing activities (FMC/026)

Multilateral control on precious metals and precious stones (FMC/029)

Multilateral control on IC transactions with scrap materials (FMC/033)

Multilateral control on maritime fishing (FMC/034)

Multilateral control on trade with sugar (FMC/035)

Multilateral control on renting players in the football sector (FMC/036)

Multilateral control on MTIC VAT fraud (FMC/038)

Multilateral control on affiliate marketing activities on the internet, (FMC/040)

Multilateral control on importation and exportation activities (FMC/041)

Multilateral control on duties paid on alcoholic beverages (FMC/046)

Multilateral control on drinks (FMC/048)

Multilateral control on the allocation of profits from real estate investments (FMC/051)

Multilateral control on trade with agricultural products (FMC/053)

Multilateral control on electronic goods (FMC/055)

Multilateral control in the field of transfer pricing on a group of companies that is active in the

production of synthetic resins (FMC/058)

Multilateral control on wine (FMC/059)

Multilateral control on calling cards (FMC/060)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing (FMC/061)

Multilateral control on check on licence fees (FMC/062)

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

Multilateral control on drinks (FMC/063)

Multilateral control on profit allocation of the permanent establishment (FMC/066)

Multilateral control on alcoholic beverages (FMC/067)

Multilateral control on profit allocation (FMC/068)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing (FMC/069)

Multilateral control on the VAT and excise implications of excise warehousing and cross

border deliveries (FMC/071)

Multilateral control on second hand cars (FMC/073)

Multilateral control on cross-border labour (FMC/074)

Multilateral control on carried Interest, MLC in the field of private equity (FMC/075)

Multilateral control on management consultancy (FMC/077)

Multilateral control on trade with used cars (FMC/078)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing (FMC/079)

Multilateral control on trade of cars (FMC/081)

Multilateral control on intra-community trade in the candy Business between Denmark and

Sweden (FMC/082)

Multilateral control on scrap area (FMC/083)

Multilateral control on trade of grain (FMC/084)

Multilateral control on trade of colza oil (FMC/085)

Multilateral control on cross border labour (FMC/086)

Multilateral control on trade of sugar (FMC/087)

Multilateral control on elite horses (FMC/089)

Multilateral control on trade with second hand cars (FMC/090)

Multilateral control in the field of black economy (FMC/091)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing (FMC/092)

Multilateral control on alcoholic beverages (FMC/093)

Multilateral control on the international trade in second hand cars sector (FMC/094)

Multilateral control in the field of private equity - Carried Interest (FMC/095)

Multilateral control on trade with trucks (FMC/096)

Multilateral control on trade with electronic goods - mobile phones (FMC/098)

Multilateral control on temporary employment (FMC/099)

Multilateral control on carousel fraud with electronic goods and telecommunication services

(FMC/100)

Multilateral control on cork cross border business (FMC/101)

Multilateral control on alcoholic beverages (FMC/102)

Multilateral control on liquefied petroleum gas (FMC/103)

Multilateral control on demand transportation services activities via mobile devices with

private drivers (FMC/105)

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

Multilateral control on transfer pricing on a group of companies in the lottery sector

(FMC/106)

Multilateral control on beers (FMC/107)

Multilateral control about structure of a company (FMC/108)

Multilateral control on adword (FMC/109)

Multilateral control on transfer prices (FMC/110)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing: valuation (FMC/111)

Multilateral control on transfer of rights (FMC/112)

Multilateral control on import of goods CPC 4000 (FMC/114)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing, licence fees and profit allocation (FMC/116)

Multilateral control on suspected hidden profit distribution (FMC/117)

Multilateral control on trade and recycling of stones and metals (FMC/118)

Multilateral control on second hand cars (FMC/119)

Multilateral control on beers (FMC/120)

Multilateral control on transfer pricing (FMC/121)

Multilateral control on construction (FMC/122)



Project groups:



Project group on EU TIN Feasibility Study (FPG/003)

Project group on Administrative cooperation – Evaluation (Art. 23 Directive 2011/16/EU)

(FPG/030)

Project group on control of electronic commerce (FPG/038)

Project group on Joint Audits (FPG/049)

Project group on AEOI statistics (FPG/053)

Workshops:



Workshop on follow-up of the reports in the field of administrative cooperation and technical

assistance (VAT) (FWS/026)



Workshop for Heads of CLO VAT and direct taxes (FWS/034)



Workshop for Heads of the CLOs of the Baltic States (FWS/042)



Workshop on Global Standard of AEOI - Directive 2014/107/EU (FWS/044)

Working visits:



Working visit on administrative cooperation in the field of excise to the Netherlands by one

Italian tax official (FWV/025)

Working visit on transfer pricing and production shifting to Romania by one German auditor

(FWV/046)

Working visit on excise approval of warehouse keepers to Finland by one Swedish tax

official (FWV/061)

Working visit on administrative cooperation to Germany by one Italian tax official (FWV/097)

Working visit on VAT identification and registration process to Italy by one German tax

inspector (FWV/103)

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

Working visit on exchange of information for direct taxes to Romania by one Italian tax

official (FWV/156)

Working visit on e-commerce to the United Kingdom by two Finnish tax officials (FWV/177)

Two working visits on enhancing international exchange of information for SCAC requests

to Czech Republic and Slovenia respectively, by two Estonian tax officials (FWV/180)

Working visit on methods and techniques for tax recovery to Estonia by one German tax

official (FWV/186)

Working visit on exchange of information for taxation purposes to Ireland by two German tax

officials (FWV/202)

Two working visits on specific VAT audits to Croatia and Latvia by two German auditors

(FWV/232)

Working visit on open-source intelligence for investigative purposes to Spain by two

Swedish officials (FWV/240)

Working visit on cross-border exchange of information via CCN network to the Netherlands

by two Belgian officials (FWV/251)

Working visit on exchange of information in VAT matters to Croatia by one Portuguese tax

auditor (FWV/259)

Working visit on information exchange under EMCS to Denmark by two Swedish tax officers

(FWV/260)

Working visit on practical implementation of the Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI)

to Denmark by five Montenegrin tax officials (FWV/272)

Expected results and their level of achievement:

Evaluation reports are issued.

Postponed

Activities are carried-out to support the functioning of the liaison Achieved

officers' networks.

Activities are carried-out aiming to support enhancing the Achieved

knowledge and understanding of Union legislation in this field.

Background information is developed to support possible Achieved

recommendations for updated legislation.

Recommendations for improvement are identified.

Activities are

information:

carried-out

enhance

the

exchange

Partially achieved

of Ongoing

New e-forms for the exchange of information on

request,

the

spontaneous

exchange

information, the feed-back and the automatic

exchange of information between Member States,

including a new e-Form for notification of

instruments and decisions are developed; training

is delivered;

Standardised IT formats are developed covering a

wide scope of income and other items, including

the addition of new languages of third countries in

the eFDT application, subject to appropriate legal

provisions;

The use of automatic exchange of information is

promoted;

Computerised formats for automatic exchange of

information are developed as provided for in

Council Directive 2011/16/EU and the proposal for

the extension of its scope;

Activities are carried-out to support the

improvement of the quality of the exchanged data

for example by further investigating the creation of

an EU Tax Identification Number (TIN) as well as

swd (2017) 0124 (forslag) - COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT Fiscalis 2020 programme Progress Report for 2015

the analysis of any alternative solution:



EU TIN study is finalised;



The information on the EC web site

concerning the TIN on Europa application

is updated;



Various target audiences are informed

about the TIN.

Country profiles are developed in an increased

number of languages and are included in an

online tool subject to appropriate legal provisions;

Consider necessary modifications to allow batch

requests from business to check VAT numbers.

New application for online transmission of statistical data is Achieved

developed: online collection and design of a web application to

collect and publish the statistics related to Council Regulation

(EU) 904/2010.

Summary of main outcomes:

The general instrument for administrative cooperation in direct taxation is Directive 2011/16/EU. In

accordance with the provisions of the Directive, the Commission developed over time with the

Member States various systems, tools and procedures to support its functioning and

implementation. In 2015, efforts were made to enhance further these developments with project

groups working e.g. on the enhancement of taxpayer's identification, the sharing of best practices as

regards compliance risk management. Given the complexity of the matter, a special focus was

placed on the automatic exchange of financial account information with activities aimed at

supporting the implementation of Directive 2014/107/EU (DAC2), which implements a Common

Reporting Standard (CRS) in the EU, both at policy level and as regards the practical aspects. A

workshop allowed the Commission and Member States to discuss the practical aspects and

complexities of the transposition of the Directive into national laws and regulations, while detailed

specifications have been established to complement the existing high-level CRS guidelines and

ensure a smooth and coordinated functioning of DAC2 in the EU.

Another domain in which Fiscalis programme was used to support administrative cooperation

between tax administrations was the Value Added Tax (VAT). VAT is a European Union tax based

on the Council Directive 112/2006, which means that each Member State is responsible for the

transposition of these provisions into national legislation and their correct application within its

territory. This results in having 28 national tax administrations jointly responsible for the correct

application of VAT rules on the single market. A close cooperation between them is necessary to

support legitimate trade and fight fraudsters. The role of the Commission is to support this

cooperation. The legal base for administrative cooperation in Value Added Tax (VAT) is provided in

the Council Regulation 904/2010

In 2015, a number of activities were set up under Fiscalis to support this administrative cooperation

in the field of VAT:



Organisation of 43 multilateral controls (coordinated controls of multinational companies)

and 49 presences in the offices of another Member States or in the framework of an

administrative enquiry. In 2015, 14 MLC have been closed with a reported value of 591

million euro in tax assessed. This value corresponds mainly to MLC carried-out in the VAT

and direct taxes area and one in excise.

A Workshop with the Member States to establish priorities for improving the practical

aspects of the administrative cooperation and the tax administrations' operability in the field

of VAT in the coming years based on the report prepared by the Commission on the state of

the administrative VAT cooperation.

A project group on e-commerce delivered its report recommending to create a new working

field within Eurofisc.

A project groups on preliminary discussions on joint audits as possible new tool that would



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enhance the cross border controls.

Results of these activities were used by the Commission in the framework of the 2016 VAT action

plan that aims at modernising the VAT system.

As regards excise duties, efforts concentrated on the work of a project group (FPG/017) which

worked on a common excise fraud manual for use by national administrations. The project group

concentrated on analysing fraud schemes in the alcohol sector and on explaining the tools and

instruments available for administrative cooperation in this area.

In the field of recovery, several project groups were active. The EU Tax Collection and Recovery

Platform (FPG/033) held three meetings dedicated to the exchange of information between Member

States, practical training session on the new e-forms, exchange of best practices on the use of e-

instalment services and the use of precautionary measures. The discussions on the use of

precautionary measures resulted in the development of a new form that could accompany requests

for precautionary measures, in order to facilitate the follow-up of such requests. This new form is

being developed in 2016 and is expected to become available for use by the Member States in

2017.

The Tax Enforcement Assistance and Cooperation Expert Panel (FPG/031) analysed issues where

the legislation on recovery assistance was (possibly) problematic, and it also provided input for the

recovery evaluation questionnaire that the Commission submitted to the Member States. In this way,

it helped the Commission in its on-going evaluation of the current EU legislation on recovery

assistance.

Last but not least, the Fiscalis project group 056 (Portal for Official Registration of Tax Orders) had

its first meeting towards the end of 2015. This project group was set up to discuss possible

improvement of the notification of tax claim documents.

6.5

Part 4 – To Support the implementation of Union law by enhancing administrative capacity of

participating countries with a view to assisting in reducing administrative burden of tax

authorities and compliance costs for taxpayers - Case Study

Specific objective:

Support the implementation of Union law by enhancing administrative capacity of

participating countries with a view to assisting in reducing administrative burden of tax

authorities and compliance costs for taxpayers

Title of the AWP Project:

e-Audit capacity of the participating countries

Description of the project:

The administrative capacity of the Member States should be supported by encouraging the use of

electronic audit techniques in the participating countries and identifying best practices and

techniques. It is intended to provide a permanent communication and exchange platform for the

development of common approaches towards e-auditing.

Actions initiated under the programme in 2015:

Project groups:



Project group on E-audit (FPG/004)

Project group on Audit of packages (FPG/025)

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

Project group on ZAPAT Activity Team (FPG/044)

Project group on Cloud Computing (FPG/048)

Project group on E-audit Promotion Activity Team (FPG/054)

Workshops:



Workshop on e-Audit on e-Commerce - Extraction and the use of data acquired from the

Internet (FWS/043)

Working visits:



Working visit on e-audit to Sweden by one Czech tax official (FWV/107)

Working visit on VAT audit for large companies to Sweden by one German tax auditor

(FWV/187)

Working visit on audit of accommodation and catering companies to the United Kingdom by

one Estonian tax auditor (FWV/229)

Working visit on fight against tax fraud for direct and indirect taxes to the Netherlands by one

French tax inspector (FWV/244)

Working visit on e-audit to the Netherlands by six Turkish tax inspection board officials

(FWV/275)

Working visit on e-tax audit to the Netherlands by three Spanish auditors (FWV/278)

Working visit on training methodologies for e-audit to the Netherlands by one Irish e-audit

expert (FWV/313)

Expected results and their level of achievement:

A quick response and sharing of best practices among Member States to

address the newly emerging challenges in the field of e-audit are facilitated.

Summary of main outcomes:

Since many years the E-audit platform provides online space for a network of E-audit experts that

share experiences and knowledge on various aspects of e-auditing. The objective of the platform is

to assist Member States in the fight against fraud and evasion and to support initiatives to improve

the level of voluntary compliance.

The structure of the E-audit platform consists of a Coordination Sub-Group (CSG) and Activity

Teams, which produce issue papers and guidance for Member States' tax administrations on

specific e-audit related topics.

The CSG's task is to manage the E-audit platform and the work carried out by the Activity Teams, to

discuss new activities and to prepare the plenary meetings. Currently, the following activity teams

are ongoing.

The Audit of packages Activity Team (FPG 025)

aims to allow Member States' auditors to audit

ERP systems, such as SAP and ORACLE. The team gave workshops and uploaded documents on

'Introduction to ERP Systems', 'Getting started with SAP' and 'Understanding SAP'. After providing a

general overview of a SAP system, the guides focus on the modules that are most relevant to

corporate tax and VAT audits. Today, the team is working on the guide 'Auditing a business', in

which they will provide guidance on how to approach both systems-based audits and data-driven

audits in a SAP system. A fifth document will cover specific topics such as transfer pricing and

dealing with heavily customized implementations.

The Zapper and Phantom-ware Activity Team (ZAPAT) (FPG 044)

shares good practices

regarding the fight against systematic skimming of cash receipts through zapper and phantom-ware

in Point of Sale (POS) systems The activity team is updating the 2012 ZAPAT guidance, developing

the idea of a Common Model and organises technical/practical workshops.

Cloud Computing and E-audit Activity Team

(FPG

048)

was established in September 2015 to

Achieved

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improve the knowledge and expertise concerning cloud computing and to identify relevant tools and

techniques. The team is performing desk research to provide a study paper, training packages,

workshops and a FAQ on cloud computing and tax-audits. The team will also update the list of

software and tools, update the E-audit Road Map, and work on a questionnaire for the Member

States to get insights in country specific information and practical cases.

The Promotion Activity Team

(FPG

054)

is in charge of promoting the use of E-audit, encouraging

activities in E-audit and maintaining a network for cooperation in E-audit. In 2015, the team

promoted the use of E-audit in the fight against tax fraud, distributed the works produced under the

E-audit Contact Persons and maintained the E-audit Forum. A newsletter was published in

December 2015.

SAF-T Activity Team (FPG 058)

has been launched recently. Their objective is to produce

documents to promote the SAF-T approach in order to offer a guide of good practice for Member

States already engaged in a SAF-T implementation process, and to inform Member States that

currently do not apply SAF-T.

6.6

Part 5 – To support the implementation of Union law - Case Study

Specific objective:

Support the implementation of Union law

Title of the AWP Project:

Implementation of Council Directive 2008/118/EC – General arrangements for excise duties

Description of the project:

Excise goods that are moved from one Member State to other Member States are subject to different

national procedures and differing interpretations of Union law. A consistent implementation of Union

law in this area is needed, both in the interests of trade facilitation and to assist Member States to

ensure the compliance of traders with the law.

Actions initiated under the programme in 2015:

Project groups:



Project group on Arrangements for distance selling and business to business sales of excise

goods released for consumption (FPG/001)

Project group on Automatic management of guarantees for movements of excise goods

under duty suspension (FPG/057)

EMCS Time Limit issue (FWS/019)

Workshop:



Working visits:

Working visit on EMCS and audit procedures to Finland by one German tax auditor

(FWV/009)

Two working visits on enhancing implementation of EU law for excise duties to Bulgaria and

Portugal by two Italian tax officials (FWV/034)

Working visit on control procedures for mineral oils to Germany by one Slovak tax auditor

(FWV/172)

Working visit on anti-fraud measures for excise duties on alcohol and tobacco to Italy by one

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Portuguese auditor (FWV/178)



Working visit on audit procedures under EMCS to Luxembourg by one German auditor

(FWV/236)

Expected results and their level of achievement:

A series of recommendations to be approved by the Indirect Tax Partially achieved

Expert Group (ITEG) concerning the application of Union law in

this area to excise goods is developed.

EMCS IT developments related to the implementation of Articles Started

10, 12, 13, 33 to 35 of Council Directive 2008/118/EC and

implementing provision to replace Regulation 31/96 are

implemented.

EMCS Statistics – the CS/MISE statistics and reporting system Partially achieved

are updated.

Business process models are defined describing the processes Partially achieved

contained in legislation in order to clarify and explain the legal

base for excise.

The report on the functioning of the Horizontal Directive is Partially achieved

prepared and promoted.

Summary of main outcomes

A Business Case for Excise Duty Paid Business to Business Transaction has been prepared on the

basis of consultations within the project group (FPG/001) and is awaiting the Commission services'

approval for work to continue in more detail. This work will also act as an input for an Impact

Assessment of possible changes to the Horizontal Excise Directive.

The project group concluded that any legal and technical changes to the arrangements for the

distance selling (business to consumer) of excise goods should await the possible introduction of a

One Stop Shop for VAT purposes, from which a Business Case could be built for similar

arrangements in order to meet the requirements for the reporting and payment of excise duty.

A report to the European Parliament and the Council evaluating the current legal provisions is

nearing completion and should be presented at the beginning of 2017.

The enhancement of EMCS Statistics will allow stakeholders to be able to judge whether the

performance of EMCS Core Business and Administrative Cooperation is improving over time. For

example CS/MISE will allow stakeholders to analyse whether the time to close excise moves and the

time to reply to requests for administrative cooperation are decreasing.

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CONCLUSIONS

2015 was the first standard year of operations under the programme, in contrast with 2014 which was

somewhat exceptional due to its shorter duration and the start of the new programme. Some of the trends

were confirmed during the year, with the continuation of slight increases in the total budget and the spending

on IT systems. However, 2015 reversed the trend of decreased number of participants, with a significant

increase surpassing the last three years in the levels of participation, as well as in the number of face-to-face

meetings organised under the programme.

The year was also marked by a successful introduction of a new type of joint action - Presences in

administrative offices / participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE) – which is already widely used, with

49 operational actions in 2015. During the year, an important groundwork was made for the introduction of

another new type of joint actions - the Expert Teams. This is a new type of a joint collaboration tool which

aims at achieving more efficiently and quickly the intended results with an increased degree of commitment,

collaboration and EU funding. Expert Teams will be especially important for larger projects that require an

intensive level of cooperation and increased funding support. TAXUD in 2015 published a comprehensive

guide to EC and national administrations' programme beneficiaries on how to apply for expert team grants.

TAXUD equally actively assisted the programme beneficiaries in preparing two detailed proposals for expert

teams, both in the area of IT collaboration. They were eventually included for realisation in the 2016 Annual

Work Programme.

The IT area remains the largest part of the programme budget, and the development and maintenance of

European Information Systems in the area of taxation remain entirely dependent on the programme. An

important new system was launched in 2015, concerning the automatic exchange of information between tax

administrations (AEOI-DAC1). Many more systems entered research and development phases thanks to the

support of the programme.

The Mini-One-Stop-Shop was one of the key initiatives in the taxation area in 2014, but it became

operational on 1 January 2015. The related electronic system allows the taxable persons established or not

in the EU and supplying telecommunications, broadcasting or electronic services to non-taxable persons to

fulfil their VAT obligations in a single place of compliance. In its first year of operations, more than 12 000

traders registered on the system across all 28 EU Member States.

In the area of training, while there were no new releases of eLearning courses, important update was done

on 12 courses on the VAT Directive, which were released in 2016 in 15 languages.

In the area of joint actions, the programme supported a rising number of activities in 2015. The cooperation

between the EC and national administration in the development and implementation of taxation policies

would be impossible without the use of project groups, seminars, workshops, working visits, multilateral

controls, capacity building activities and other types of joint actions. In terms of performance measurement,

2015 was the first year with a full 12-month period of activities monitored. This meant more participants and

action managers invited to take the surveys and a greater number of collected data. Whilst at the start of the

programme baselines were lacking for a great number of the new indicators, in 2015 we could compare the

obtained values against the 2014 indicators. In the great majority of cases we could observe minimal

fluctuations and a positive trend. In a small number of cases the fluctuations seem more pronounced, such

as in the case of number of individual outputs of activities. While these measurements represent useful data

to be collected, it will take a few additional years of measurement to see whether any targets could be set for

these indicators.

The indicators obtained under the framework in 2015 give an overall positive assessment, both from the

business data perspective and from the feedback obtained from the action managers and the participants to

the activities. The indicators suggest that in 2015 the programme was on course to fulfilling its objectives and

that it played an important role in facilitating the implementation and development of taxation policies through

its European Information Systems, joint actions and human competency building.

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The key

strengths and achievements

that can be deduced from the analysis of the indicators:



Increased demand for programme support.

This can be seen in the general increase of the

number of activities, events organised and participation levels. In the area of IT, there is an

increased demand for the programme support in the development of new systems.

Successful introduction of a new type of joint actions - Presences in administrative offices /

participation in administrative enquiries (PAOE)

– which is already widely used, with 49

operational actions in 2015.

High level of achievement of results of the joint actions is reported by the action managers.

The level increased compared to the previous year. This indicates that the business owners see the

value of the programme for achieving the policy objectives and that the joint actions progress in line

with their expectations.

Very positive assessment of the achieved results of the joint actions, their usefulness and

met expectations by national tax officials who participated in them.

With minor fluctuations

between the two years, the values remain high and above targets. This shows that the programme

participants find that the programme activities correspond to their stated objectives and are

professionally useful to them.

Networking among programme participants is increasing.

The networking indicator remains high

and has increased between the two years, testifying to the networking value provided to the

participants by the programme.

The European Information Systems are regularly upgraded and improved and resistant to

increased volume of data traffic.

The volume of data traffic on European Information Systems

increased by a large margin in 2015, while the performance and availability remained very high. A

new system was launched and new developments are largely taking place in line with the planning.

The systems are regularly maintained and updated and the user support and training are functioning

properly.

Successful roll out of the Mini-One-Stop-Shop IT system -

In its first year of operations, more

than 12 000 traders registered on the system across all 28 EU Member States.

The increased use of online collaboration (PICS) by national and European tax officials.

2015, there were further significant increases in the number of online groups created, the number of

users and the number of exchanged files on the platform.



The

conclusions

from the previous Progress Report for 2014 have been or are in the process of being

followed up (see table 18 below for a complete overview). The 2015 indicators do not warrant any specific

new conclusions, but a number of those from 2014 could be further specified or updated:

Provide additional support to the sharing of programme outputs.

There continues to be a

discrepancy between what action manager and national participants report concerning the sharing of

programme outputs at national level. As it was recommended in the 2014 Progress Report, a more

structured and transparent approach to the sharing of programme outputs would be desirable, since

it would both shed more light on the current use of programme outputs nationally, as well as

potentially open up this resource to many more tax officials. Such an approach would, however,

need to address a number of security, privacy and technical challenges involved in such a larger

distribution of outputs, as well as involve a cultural change among the programme stakeholders. Its

success would very much depend on the support and involvement of all programme stakeholders

and in particular of the senior management and the action managers. TAXUD initiated in 2016

discussions on creating such an approach with the stakeholders and intends to follow them up.

Progress in this initiative should be seen as a longer term goal that will require gradual change, both

in terms of securing necessary stakeholders' support and possible adaptations of IT systems.

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Address the participants' response rate under the Performance Measurement Framework.

The

response rate for the action managers remained at 70%, while the response rates for the participants

to working visits and participants to other types of joint action decreased to 63% and 56%

respectively. TAXUD and national programme teams should pay attention to the response rate and

try to bring it above the 70% mark. Changes introduced in the distribution of survey invitations,

scheduled to be implemented in early 2017, should provide some support in this respect.

Table 17: Overview of conclusions from the Progress Report 2014 and current status update

Conclusions

from

Progress Report

2014 Status and follow up actions

Need for further actions

1. Monitor the number of

participants in order to

evaluate whether any action

aimed at reversing the trend

of decrease is warranted

The 2015 data show a

significant increase in the

number

participants

compared to 2014.

There is currently no need for

specific follow up actions. The

number of participants will

continue to be monitored as

part of the basic programme

parameters.

TAXUD will use the Programme

Poll at the end of 2016 to gather

new data on the awareness and

will equally use qualitative

feedback

from

national

programme teams to evaluate

the implementation of the

communication plan during

2017.

Increase in the sharing of

programme outputs requires

both a new policy and cultural

change that must involve and

supported

all

stakeholders. TAXUD intends to

launch in-depth discussions

with stakeholders on this topic

during 2016 and 2017.

2. Undertake to increase

New communication plan for the

awareness

about

the

programme was drawn up and

its activities started to be

programme

implemented in 2016.

2015

changes

3. Provide additional support

Following

to networking and the use of

introduced in PICS, all tax

officials from the participating

programme outputs

countries can freely start their

own collaboration groups on

this platform. TAXUD equally

started to promote online

meetings on the platform.

Internal

discussions

were

started on how to facilitate the

sharing of programme outputs

to a wider audience and

overcome challenges identified

in this regard.

4. Monitor the use of the new

PAOE indicator is included and

measured for the first time in

types of joint actions

this report. Expert teams will

start their work in 2016 and will

be included in that report.

5. Improve statistics

online collaboration

There is no need for specific

follow up actions concerning

PAOE. Expert teams will be

included in the 2016 report.

statistical

module There is no need for specific

for

New

containing more information on follow up actions.

online

collaboration

was

deployed on PICS in 2016.

system

became This indicator will be included in

6. Monitor the implementation

MOSS

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and use of the Mini-One-Stop

operational in 2015 and the first future reports.

measurements of the number of

-Shop IT system

registered

operators

are

included in this report.

7. Facilitate the collection and

New system of sending of Future evolution of ART will

processing of data under the

invitations to PMF surveys will take into account the needs of

be put in place in ART in 2017.

the Performance Measurement

PMF

Framework.

8. Consider adaptation to the

Following positive reception of There will be a continuous

the 2014 report by the assessment on how to improve

Progress Report structure

stakeholders,

2015

report the report.

followed largely the same

structure, with some minor

adjustments.