ADSENSE READY
INTERNASIONAL - Google almost reached an agreement with the Indonesian government to pay tax arrears.
In a deal that is expected to achieve the next few weeks, Indonesia relieve Google of tax arrears to 73 million US dollars, or about Rp998,05 billion.
This was disclosed by the Head Office of the Directorate of Tax Special Jakarta, Muhammad Haniv, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday (23/11/2016).
"Consider this a tax amnesty for Google," he said.
As is known, the President of the Republic of Indonesia Joko Widodo since some time ago released a tax amnesty policy to pursue tax dikemplang by businessmen in Indonesia. This was done to fund infrastructure projects.
Furthermore, representatives of Google Asia Pacific has several times back and forth from their head office in Singapore to Jakarta for talks with the regulator, said a source familiar with the case.
Google also requested a meeting with Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati, but was rejected.
Numbers in the agreement almost reached Google by Indonesia itself is far below the actual tax arrears.
In September, Haniv, told Reuters, saying that Google is estimated to be in arrears of about $ 400 million (Rp5.4 trillion) of digital ad revenue in Indonesia in 2015.
In the past year, the company is headquartered in Mountain View, California is allegedly only pay 0.1 percent of total revenue and value-added tax that should be paid, with most of the revenue flows to Google Asia Pacific office in Singapore.
Various countries in the world is trying to push Google to pay taxes dikemplang over the years, including in Thailand, Australia, and the United Kingdom.
Analysts assess the success of Indonesia will make other countries more aggressively pursue Google's tax arrears.
"I think the other countries with significant populations will certainly strive to pursue tax from Google," said Executive Director of the Center for Indonesian Taxation Analysis, Justin Prastowo told Reuters.
Google spokesman declined to comment on this news.
