State Secretary Marnix van Rij (Finance) writes this in a letter to the House of Representatives. “People with savings are taxed on the basis of the current savings interest. In recent years, that has been almost 0%,” said the minister.
The cabinet had to come up with this repair following a judgment of the Supreme Court. At the end of last year, he put an end to the current box 3 tax and demanded restoration of rights for the period 2017 to now. For the time being, only the 60,000 objectors will receive a refund. In the autumn, Van Rij will decide whether other large savers will also be accommodated. He is awaiting a new trial for that.
Now he was faced with the choice of whether he would only reconsider the tax on savings accounts or also the tax on investments. The latter option would cost a lot more money and also require a lot more research, because then the returns on investments would be re-examined each year. Over the bad stock market years 2018 and 2020, wealthy people could then get money back, because the tax authorities work with fictitious returns that are sometimes higher than the actual return.
Risks
Civil servants have said in the House of Representatives that there are legal risks associated with the variant that the State Secretary now chooses. They fear many additional legal procedures that the Tax and Customs Administration will have to process. In the judgment, the Supreme Court focuses in particular on savers who had to pay tax while the interest rate was now 0%. But the judges also stood up for investors ‘who – through lack of insight or fortune – have to pay for their choice with a low return or with a loss of capital’.
From now on, the tax authorities will only tax the actual savings interest for all taxpayers. Van Rij says that this will already apply to the declarations for 2021. “These attacks will be imposed in phases from August,” said the State Secretary. The compensation for the years 2017-2020 is also handled automatically. “Taxpayers do not have to take any action to receive the reinstatement. They will automatically receive a refund before the latest date of August 4.
Anyone who has not objected to his box 3 tax will not receive any compensation for the time being, Van Rij recently announced in a parliamentary debate. A case is currently pending before the Supreme Court about a complainant who is entitled to a so-called official reduction, which is a procedure after the declaration has already been formally settled. The Advocate General has advised the Supreme Court to also offer compensation in such cases. If the judges go along with this, the costs for the cabinet could rise to around 7 billion euros.
The current compensation of 2.8 billion euros is 400 million euros more than Van Rij recently informed the House of Representatives. According to his spokesperson, the difference is in ‘not yet imposed attacks’.
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