VAT Refund: Compliant Businesses Prioritized For Processing

Notable news from the Tax sector: Businesses with a good history of tax law compliance will have their Value Added Tax (VAT) refund applications prioritized for quick processing, contributing to easing capital difficulties and boosting production and business. This move comes as the General Department of Taxation (GDT) is accelerating the progress of tax refund processing nationwide.

According to data announced by the GDT, in just the first 3 months of 2025, the entire sector issued 3,911 VAT refund decisions with a total disbursed amount reaching VND 31,128 billion. This impressive figure demonstrates the efforts of the tax authorities, while also representing a 6% increase compared to the same period in 2024, reflecting recovering economic demand and activity.

Positive VAT Refund Results, Supporting Business Capital Rotation

VAT refund procedures have been strongly implemented by the GDT, particularly through electronic tax refunds, achieving an efficiency rate of up to 99%. This has significantly simplified procedures for taxpayers.

Notably, approximately 86% of VAT refund applications under the “refund first, inspect later” category have been quickly processed by the tax authorities, within just 6 working days from receiving complete applications as regulated.

Looking back at 2024, the entire Tax sector issued 19,806 refund decisions with a total amount of VND 156,941 billion, a 5% increase compared to 2023. These results are assessed as having positively contributed to supporting businesses and investors with additional capital for rotation, strongly promoting production, business, and export activities.

Accelerating Application Processing Progress: Bottlenecks Still Need To Be Resolved

Despite achieving many positive results, the GDT also acknowledges that, according to feedback from taxpayers, in some localities, the progress of processing VAT refund applications is still slow, not meeting the stipulated time requirements, affecting business operations.

Decisive Directives From The GDT: Prioritizing Compliant Businesses, Resolving Backlogs

To address these issues and continue improving the effectiveness of VAT refund procedures, creating maximum convenience for businesses and investors, the GDT has just issued Official Letter 563/CT-NVT requesting its subordinate units to seriously implement several key contents:

Proactively support businesses right from the application filing stage: Organize reviews of businesses with export activities (goods, services) and investment projects. Proactively guide and support businesses and investors early on in tax declaration and preparing refund applications, ensuring applications are complete and accurate, avoiding difficulties and issues for taxpayers.

Review and definitively resolve outstanding refund applications: Direct functional departments to urgently review and compile all pending VAT refund applications. Classify them in detail by group of subjects, types of goods (especially key export items such as textiles and garments, footwear, wood and wood products, agricultural products, seafood, iron and steel, electronic components…). Clearly identify the reasons for delays, difficulties, issues, and set specific deadlines for resolving each application. Allocate sufficient personnel, clearly assign tasks, and organize weekly monitoring and progress checks. The set goal is to strive to have no overdue applications by the end of May 2025, except for high-risk cases or suspected fraud cases currently under verification and inspection.

Prioritize timely refunds for compliant businesses: For taxpayers with a good history of tax law compliance, whose applications meet all regulated conditions and show no signs of risk, the tax authorities must process refunds within the stipulated timeframe, ensuring the legitimate rights of businesses.

Enhance direct dialogue and issue resolution: Sub-Departments of Taxation are requested to assign managing officials to support businesses and directly guide taxpayers. Particularly, organize dialogue sessions and direct meetings with associations, businesses, and investors during the period from April 15, 2025, to April 29, 2025, to listen and promptly resolve issues within their authority. For matters exceeding their authority, they must report immediately to the GDT for guidance and solutions.

These decisive directives from the GDT demonstrate a high determination to improve the VAT refund process, especially prioritizing the group of compliant businesses, thereby making a significant contribution to stabilizing and developing the country’s economy.