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Revenu Québec
Re-engineering of Corporate Income Tax Systems
Quebec Processes Business Taxes More Efficiently - And Sends Refunds Twice as Fast - Under Its New System
Challenge
Revenu Québec collects 80 per cent of Québec government revenues. It collected $66.6 billion in fiscal year 2004-2005. The funding of most government programs depends on the efficiency of its operations. About 1,735 employees of Revenu Québec are involved in processing corporate taxes from 350,000 businesses.
The department needed to improve the efficiency of its corporate income tax processes, to automate procedures and to meet the needs of businesses for fast, modern online services.
To achieve that, Revenu Québec determined to replace its legacy corporate income-tax systems with high-performance and upgradeable technologies to:
- Cut down on processing time;
- Maintain the accuracy and security of business data;
- Issue clear information to businesses;
- Set up systems and information infrastructures that broaden the range of electronic services offered to businesses.
Solution
In a $22-million project completed in 2005, Revenu Québec re-engineered its corporate income tax systems, making them Web-enabled and vastly improving both the efficiency of the department and the scope of its business services.
The project included:
- Implementation of a secure high-speed network linking departmental offices, primarily in Montreal and Quebec City, as well as enabling remote access by authorized staff;
- Integration of several legacy systems and the creation of a multi-purpose, user-friendly graphic interface for staff to gain access to them;
- Design and implementation of a new data-processing system and the processes to go with it.
Revenu Québec's tax experts were called upon to help with the automation of tax rules, with the result that identification, accounting and collection of data for each businesses is managed in a unified and integrated way. A complete profile of the business is available online throughout the corporate income tax service.
The department upgraded the quality of information on its Web site, www.revenu.gouv.qc.ca, and made available improved guides and forms. Businesses can now use electronic services to file their tax return and consult their tax records.
The project instituted automated tracking of the physical files of corporate income tax returns kept in storage, so that staff time required to access a physical file was cut by 80 per cent.
Results
Of 330,000 corporate tax returns processed between April 2005 and June 2006, 35 per cent were processed and audited without human intervention. Furthermore, 95 per cent of amended returns processed between December 2005 and June 2006 were processed and audited without human intervention. Before re-engineering, each tax return required a manual operation.
Processing of returns is done more quickly. The average processing time for an original corporate tax return has dropped by 50 per cent since 2000/2001.
The automation of processing, calculating penalties for late returns and issuing notices for failure to file enabled Revenu Québec to increase its tax-recovery revenue to $100 million in 2004/2005 from $47 million in 2001/2002, an increase of 113 per cent with no increase in the number of employees.
In 2004/2005, Revenu Québec refunded $1.7 billion in income taxes to businesses, mostly small- to medium-sized businesses. Those refunds were processed twice as fast as in 200/2001.
Innovative Use of Technology
Tax measures are frequently modified after budget speeches, so the design of the new systems was inspired by an innovative model. It enables the creation of new versions of corporate income tax return forms without making changes to the databases. This means that automation of new tax measures can be easily accomplished with a minimum of manipulation of system components.
The new systems were developed using computer programs reusable in several technological environments. Thus, the same program is used for batch processing, direct processing and processing from a Web site, ensuring consistency in processing of corporate tax returns while reducing development costs.
During the re-engineering, switching mechanisms permitted activation of the new systems and deactivation of the legacy systems in a step-by-step manner, during each of six delivery phases, without disrupting operational activities.
A 2006 CIPA Winner!
For its exceptional application of information technology to transform its processes and bring benefits to stakeholders, Revenu Québec has been awarded a 2006 CIPA Gold Award of Excellence in the Efficiency and Operational Improvement, Not For Profit category.
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