Regulatory Analysis
Proposed ACA replacement legislation, entitled the American Health Care Act (AHCA), aims to dismantle the employer mandate by zeroing out the associated penalties. Despite this, the AHCA maintains both employer and insurer reporting requirements. There are seven high-level changes to the current law that the AHCA will seek to impose: Nullify Individual Mandate […]
Senate negotiations regarding the fate of the American Health Care Act are continuing in spite of the discord among and between Democrats and Republicans on a number of provisions in the bill. Much of the roadblocks at this point are procedural in nature regarding the Reconciliation rules. A failure to comply with Reconciliation requirements would […]
On Thursday, June 8, 2017, the United Kingdom held its general election for Parliamentary seats, and the election concluded with shocking results, leaving the U.K. with no overall majority in the House of Commons. The report of the results was a disappointment for Prime Minister Theresa May, who was hoping to increase her Conservative Party’s majority, […]
The Isle of Man recently issued an AEOI Industry Advisory Notice. Therein, the Treasury reminded filers that FATCA and CRS reporting will be due June 30. The notice also stated that filing entities should be registered to file by June 21. Doing so after that date might not allow the Treasury enough time to […]
Pakistan’s Ministry of Finance has joined the Common Reporting Standard by signing on to the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA), bringing the total number of signatories to 90 countries. As such, Pakistan will aim to begin the Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI) for its reportable accounts in 2018. By signing on to this agreement, […]
The Panamanian Ministry of Economy and Finance has released additional information regarding its implementation of the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). A late adopter, Panama has committed to commencing exchanges in 2018. Panama has ratified secondary legislation for the implementation of CRS – the final legislative step in imposing the duty to report on Panamanian […]
The Guatemalan government has adopted the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters in a move to demonstrate its commitment to tax transparency and remove itself from a “blacklist” of international tax havens. Once it takes the necessary legislative steps to implement the OECD programs, Guatemala will be able to exchange information with […]
The Curacao Financial Data Exchange Portal is now open for the FATCA XML file testing period. The testing period, which was originally scheduled to begin on May 29, was delayed due to technical difficulties. As such, the data delivery functionality and reporting deadlines will also be delayed to dates which will be determined at a […]
The Cypriot Ministry of Finance has announced that its Government Internet Security Channel is now open for the acceptance of FATCA and CRS XML files containing tax year 2016 data. The reporting process consists of the following steps: Subscribe to the Internet Security Channel if you are not already registered Register to the […]
Rhode Island recently updated their reporting frequency schedule to exclude the annual reporting frequency. The update to the 2017 Employer’s Income Tax Withholding Tables and the removal of Form RI-941A from the Department of Revenue website confirm that filers previously on an annual reporting schedule must switch to one of the remaining reporting schedules – […]
The Indian Central Board of Excise and Customs has published the final GST return formats and return rules on its website as of June 3rd, 2017. GST return formats maybe found here. GST return rules may be found here. Full implementation of GST in India takes effect on July 1, 2017. The post India Publishes Final […]
Effective July 1,2017, five jurisdictions in Arkansas will either increase or decrease their sales and use tax rates. The locations impacted by this change include, the city of Eureka Springs, which is decreasing the sales and use tax rate to 2.25%; the city of Lamar, which is increasing the rate to 2.0%; the city of […]
The State of Tennessee has enacted House Bill 534, also known as the IMPROVE Act. This legislation is effective July 1, 2017 and reduces the sales and use tax on food and food ingredients from 5% to 4% . Food and food ingredients includes substances that are sold for ingestion or chewing by humans and […]
Last July the City of Tacoma, Washington passed Ordinance No. 28367, a “Bring Your Own Bag Ordinance.” This law bans the distribution of disposable plastic bags by retailers and imposes a minimum five cent fee on paper bags. Retailers (including restaurants), will be allowed to keep this fee. The law does not apply to bags for […]
Irish Revenue has sent correspondence to all interested parties indicating that the deadline for filing CRS returns has been extended from June 30th to August 18, 2017 due to the late delivery of the required business and validation rules – resulting in a delay to the start of filing. Although the submission application is […]
The UK government has introduced draft legislation that would apply VAT to telecommunications services used outside of the European Union by private UK customers. Under current “use and enjoyment” provisions, such services are not subject to VAT when used outside of the EU. The government claims that this change will remove any ambiguity about place […]
Last month, the OECD launched its public disclosure facility in order for interested parties to submit potential schemes they believe are being used to circumvent the Common Reporting Standard. The facility’s goal is to understand these schemes or loopholes to further strengthen CRS’s effectiveness in promoting greater transparency. Within a month, the OECD had received […]
Bulgaria has recently announced that it will require its Reporting Financial Institutions to use the schema designed by the OECD for this month’s CRS reporting. On its AEOI website, Bulgaria has provided samples and schema files to assist. In addition, there is a list of Reportable Jurisdictions published. As a reminder, CRS reports are due […]