Company staff tax brief aids business field

Hongkou District government has sent its company service staff to learn the latest in tax legislation in a bid to optimize the region’s business environment.

Staff will attend Hongkou bureau of State Administration of Taxation to be briefed on all tax-related issues such as tax payments from newly founded companies, relocation of companies and how to use an invoice.

Companies in the past, especially startup firms, have complained to the district government that they often encountered difficulties when dealing with tax related issues, but could not find any support.

A Hongkou-based investment management company, Yinhe Xingbang, for example, found it could not issue invoices of over a million yuan (US$144,123.37) because the company was newly founded and had a limited invoice quota.

Fortunately, Mao Jun, one of the investment promotion staff who helped the company’s registration, managed to apply a temporary million-yuan invoice for the company.

“The investment promotion staff appeared to be as professional as tax officials and even more helpful than the professional staff,” said Jiang Miao, the boss of the company.

She said that without Mao, her company might lose an important client due to the difficulty of supplying an invoice.

It is part of the district government’s efforts to offer better services and optimize its business environment for companies based in Hongkou.

The district government has established the city’s first district-level company service bureau to offer professional and reliable support to companies and help them solve all kinds of problems.

The bureau has released a service list for 2018 involving the most frequent difficulties that the companies face.

“We service staff have to keep learning new knowledge to help solve the problems for companies in time,” Mao said.

“Tax-related issues are the most common difficulties to the companies, and the tax-related laws and regulation are often changing.”

The service bureau has invited senior officials from the tax bureau to serve as mentors to the service staff like Mao. They can consult with mentors once they encounter a tough case, according to the bureau.

Apart from the tax training, the bureau will train the company service staff to solve various talent issues. A group of “talent specialists” will be trained to help professionals to apply for a residence permit, housing subsidies as well as medical, education and other issues.