The National Tax Service (Director Im Gwang-hyeon) held a field communication meeting on the 10th to address the tax difficulties faced by personal income service earners and announced improvements in the notification and refund procedures for income tax refunds.
This meeting was attended by organizations of personal income service earners, such as the National Delivery Riders Association, the Korea Proxy Drivers Association, and the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions Riders Union Branch.
Director Im Gwang-hyeon said, “I express my gratitude to the personal income service earners who work persistently even in economically challenging situations,” adding, “The National Tax Service will directly guide to ensure that small taxpayers can receive refunds easily without any fees.”
The target of this refund guidance includes 1.18 million taxpayers who have not yet claimed refunds amounting to 1.598 trillion won and 290,000 personal income earners with new refund cases this year, totaling 1.47 million taxpayers. The total refund amount reaches 1.985 trillion won.
The National Tax Service has significantly simplified the refund application procedures. The mobile notification includes a “Sontax declaration shortcut” button to allow applications for up to five years of refunds with only personal authentication and account input, without running a separate app. In cases where mobile use is difficult, applications can be completed through ARS by entering an individual authentication number, the last digits of the resident registration number, and the refund account.
Moreover, dedicated refund hotlines have been set up at seven regional tax offices to immediately address any inconveniences occurring during the application process. The National Tax Service plans to distribute refunds received by September 20 before the Chuseok holiday.
The organizations participating in the meeting pointed out issues such as the recurrent occurrence of refunds due to the withholding tax rate (3.3%) and the complexity of comprehensive income tax filing and refund procedures for small personal income service earners. Director Im responded, “We will review the reasonable withholding tax rate and aim to improve the system gradually so that the National Tax Service directly manages the comprehensive income tax filing and refund for small taxpayers.”
The National Tax Service stated that it would continue enhancing support for small taxpayers and improving tax services for socially disadvantaged groups to back up the economy for people’s livelihoods effectively.