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Customers unable to file taxes amid bank delays

Hundreds of thousands of Germans may not be able to file their 2009 taxes on time, a media report said on Tuesday. System changes at many of the country’s top banks have led to delays in sending out tax records.

Customers unable to file taxes amid bank delays
Photo: DPA

Account holders at Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, Dresdner Bank and Targobank are most likely to experience delays, daily Financial Times Deutschland reported. These banks have only sent a portion of their customers’ files for 2009 related to the government’s 25 percent tax on investment income such as interest payments and dividends.

This could mean that many won’t be able to file their tax forms by the May 31 deadline, the paper said.

The banks have reportedly been trying to adjust their systems for months to suit complex new rules first released by the Finance Ministry on December 22 in a 150-page document.

Some 719,000 private customers at Commerzbank subsidiary Comdirect are said to be still awaiting their account balances, while another 300,000 at Targobank are still empty-handed. Many of these customers are owners of foreign investments, though normal citizens and pensioners will also face delays, the paper said.

The original version of this article mistakenly mentioned capital gains when meaning unearned income such as interest and dividends. We have corrected the error.

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TAXES

Beskæftigelsesfradraget: What is Denmark’s employment allowance?

Denmark's government may soon announce changes to its tax reform plans, which will give all wage earners a bigger employment allowance. What is this and how will it affect foreigners' earnings?

Beskæftigelsesfradraget: What is Denmark's employment allowance?

What is the employment allowance? 

The Beskæftigelsesfradraget (from beskæftigelse, meaning employment, and fradrag, meaning rebate) was brought in by the centre-right Liberal Party back in 2004, the idea being that it would incentivise people to get off welfare and into a job.

Everyone whose employer pays Denmark’s 8 percent AM-bidrag, or arbejdsmarkedsbidrag, automatically receives beskæftigelsesfradraget. Unlike with some of Denmark’s tax rebates, there is no need to apply. The Danish Tax Agency simply exempts the first portion of your earnings from income taxes. 

In 2022, beskæftigelsesfradraget was set at 10.65 percent of income with a maximum rebate of 44,800 kroner. 

How did the government agree to change the employment allowance in its coalition deal? 

In Responsibility for Denmark, the coalition agreement between the Social Democrats, the Liberals and the Moderate Party, the new government said it would set aside 5 billion kroner for tax reforms.

Of this, 4 billion kroner was earmarked for increasing the employment allowance, with a further 0.3 billion going towards increasing an additional employment allowance for single parents.

According to the public broadcaster DR, the expectation was that this would increase the standard employment  allowance to 12.75 percent up to a maximum rebate of 53,600 kroner. 

How might this be further increased, according to Børsen? 

According to a report in the Børsen newspaper, the government now plans to set aside a further 1.75 billion kroner for tax reforms, of which nearly half — about 800 million kroner — will go towards a further increase to the employment allowance. 

The Danish Chamber of Commerce earlier this month released an analysis in which it argued that by raising removing all limits on the rebate for single parents and raising the maximum rebate for everone else by 20,300 kroner, the government could increase the labour supply by 4,850 people, more than double the 1,500 envisaged in the government agreement. 

According to the Børsen, the government estimates that its new extended allowance will increase the labour supply by 5,150 people.  

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