A meagre 1 million of 11 million individual taxpayers have filed personal income tax returns since the filing season started at the beginning of this year, the Revenue Department's chief says.
Less than 10% of individuals who are obliged to file tax returns filed for the 2017 year with the tax-collecting agency and the ratio is considered to be quite low, with half of the filing season having passed, said Prasong Poontaneat, director-general of the department.
The 2017 tax filing season runs through the end of March for paper filing and the deadline for electronic filing is April 9.
He blamed insurance companies' payment documents for health insurance premiums, as the cabinet approved the tax deductible item late last year.
Taxpayers can claim a deduction of up to 15,000 baht for premiums paid for health insurance provided by both life and non-life insurers, but insurance premiums of up to 100,000 baht can be claimed when premiums paid for life protection products with at least 10-year terms are combined.
The department recently forecast the number of individual taxpayers who will receive tax refunds for the 2017 tax year will be 25% higher than 2016 at 4 million, thanks to the larger number of standard deductions and allowances and the widened income band of the 30% tax bracket and the top rate.
The new personal income tax structure, which came into force last year, gives each taxpayer a 60,000-baht tax allowance, doubled from 30,000 a year, while the cap on income deductions has been raised to 50%, but only for up to 100,000 baht. The previous cap was 40% for up to 60,000 baht.
With the larger tax deductions, individual taxpayers who earn below 26,000 baht a month are tax-exempt, up from around 20,000 a month in the past.
The income range for the 30% bracket has been raised to 2-5 million baht from 2-4 million, and the range for the top rate of 35% starts from 5 million.
Parents are permitted to claim a child allowance of 30,000 baht each without any limits on the number of biological children, and for up to three adopted children. Previously, individual taxpayers could claim a 15,000-baht allowance per child and an additional 2,000 baht per child for education, for up to three children.
Mr Prasong said the Revenue Department will focus on disbursing tax refunds as fast as possible, with around 10 million taxpayers expected to file tax returns during the remaining period.
He said 80% of those who already filed tax returns have received some refunds and have expressed interest in receiving the returns through PromptPay.