From the Single Tax Registry (STR), the DIAN has implemented important improvements in its service using new technologies, registration, and updating of the registry, and constant automatic updates following regulatory changes and needs of all DIAN processes, in tax, customs, exchange, and international taxation aspects.

The STR is very important for the DIAN since it is the first contact that the citizen has with the Tax Administration. It is of continuous interest to continue modernizing this information system with the latest technologies, diversifying its use through different digital channels as a part of adaptation to the new environment that intensified as a result of the pandemic in 2020.

In general, a consistent and updated taxpayer registry optimizes the management of the tax administration in decision-making. It minimizes the risk of performing inefficient control and inspection activities, for which the administration must implement technological improvement actions to guarantee reliable and timely information.

For this reason, DIAN has made great efforts in technological innovation and improvement in its procedures, regulations, simplification of procedures, achieving greater accessibility, usability, and a better service experience for its citizens-clients.

In 2020, DIAN was recognized as a leader in simplifying procedures within the strategy of the Colombian Government “Simple State, Agile Colombia“, with the implementation of the registration of the STR online, with which it was possible to obtain 100% registration online, without travel, or scheduling appointments, facilitating relationships with taxpayers, eliminating barriers by streamlining procedures and reducing administrative costs for citizens with the help of technology.

STR transactions

The STR contains more than 18 million records managed by DIAN for its purposes.

The interaction of the DIAN with its taxpayers is increasingly recurrent, since from 2004 to 2020 a total of 43,273,893 transactions have been accumulated for registration, updating, suspension, reactivation, and cancellation of the STR. Per year, in 2020, 1,583,566 transactions were generated in the STR service.

Digital STR

In September 2020, the STR online registration service was implemented for the expiration of personal income tax returns. With this digitalization of the process, 181,103 new taxpayers were allowed to register online as of December 2020. As of March 31, 2021, there are 344,065 new registrants for this new service.

This service can be accessed directly from the DIAN website and also through the DIAN APP.

For those taxpayers who for some reason cannot manage themselves, the DIAN has a video service to facilitate the STR process with the assistance of a DIAN official.

STR 360° STRATEGY

In 2020, the pilot implementation of an internal registry management and control model was designed through the umbrella strategy “STR 360 ° the path to more reliable, useful and timely information“, which has contributed to the establishment of Comprehensive alerts of the IS STR covering other related information systems.  This facilitates the monitoring and control of irregular situations of fraud and corruption, which threaten the integrity and veracity of the information of the Single Tax Registry, taking as reference actions of control associated with risk management and information security internally.

On the other front of the strategy (quality), we have the actions designed to guarantee the reliability of the information. Among them, the quality review of the information incorporated into the registry for individuals and legal entities, second-level reviews by the central level, as well as externally, to encourage voluntary compliance with the programming of campaigns for certain groups of taxpayers according to information consistency diagnoses, to keep the Single Tax Registry updated and to contribute to the shock plan against evasion.

In 2020, 12,306 ex officio updated registrations have been made registrations have been made within the STR debugging campaign with an effectiveness of 92% of the total selected. From the periodic quality review of the STR, there is an indicator of 97% quality in the registry of individuals and 93% of legal entities.

In 2020, a STR quality instruction manual was designed that contains the definition and regulatory framework of all the STR boxes distributed in the 7 pages of the form that composes it, as a guide to fill out the STR information with better quality for its use by internal users.

SINGLE TAX WINDOW FOR COMPANIES.

With the aim of facilitating business activity by reducing costs, time, and the number of procedures associated with the opening of companies, it was necessary to create a computer services solution that allows interoperability between the VUE and the DIAN, for the STR registration process of a client who formalizes the beginning of his commercial activities through the Chambers of Commerce at the national level. This project includes the following services:

• STR consultation service to identify, based on the type and number of the document, if a user currently registers a TIN created and in force, sending a copy of the STR to the email in it, in case of already being registered. 

• Service that responds to the Chamber of Commerce with the codes of tax responsibilities suggested to the user, from the application of validations on the data initially sent regarding the characteristics of the company to be created, to facilitate the process. 

• Service of generation and formalization of the STR from the successful validation of the registration data sent by the Chamber of Commerce, at the time of the creation of the company. It will be eliminated from the document being processed by the Chamber of Commerce, known as pre-STR, further simplifying the process.

In 2021, it is expected to have the pilot for the execution of this new STR registration service.

TR SYSTEM UPDATE

Periodically, the STR system is updated in its versions with new adjustments, functionalities, massive updates, for its optimal performance and availability for citizens.

In 2020, more than 35 adjustment projects were carried out that allowed incorporating services to update the tool with new coding to identify and classify taxpayers by needs of all DIAN processes and 218,935 massive updates to taxpayers automatically.

ELECTRONIC SIGNATURE

To carry out electronic transactions with the TA, in July 2020 the DIAN has arranged a new version of electronic signature to subscribe to online tax returns, STR updates, billing numbering, third-party reporting, among other transactions, as an entity ever closer, digital, and reliable.

From July 2020 to February 2021, more than 2,410,798 electronic signatures have been generated. This signature is costless for taxpayers and this version is much simpler and more agile to use, since citizens can self-manage by generating their electronic signature through the DIAN web services, without the need to travel.

MODERNIZATION CHALLENGES

In view of the DIAN technological modernization project, the STR is a priority for DIAN, for which it is working on this project with new technologies that will allow greater interoperability with other state databases and a better user experience with the systems. DIAN, working in parallel with information debugging actions for a much more reliable data migration, is always seeking to improve the relationship with the citizen, promoting voluntary compliance with their obligations.

The STR as an information asset is increasingly demanded by public entities to validate the information of people who are applying as candidates for economic aid from the Government that has been arranged in view of the Covid 19 crisis. Therefore, it is a continuous commitment to continue managing the Single Tax Registry so that its information is more reliable and timelier, with the support of new information technologies.

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