OECD seeks feedback on tax treaty dispute resolution

The OECD is seeking taxpayer input on the tax treaty dispute resolution process in a second tranche of countries and is seeking comments on the mutual agreement procedure (MAP) in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Sweden.

Improving the tax treaty dispute resolution process is identified as a priority of the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project. Action 14 provides for a MAP peer review and monitoring process, which was launched in December 2016 with the first peer reviews of Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the UK and the US currently underway.

The Action 14 minimum standard assess a country’s legal and administrative framework including the practical implementation of that framework to determine how its MAP regime performs in four key areas – preventing disputes, availability and access to MAP, resolution of MAP cases and implementation of MAP agreements.

The peer review process is conducted in two stages. Under stage 1, implementation of the Action 14 minimum standard is evaluated for inclusive framework members. Stage 2 focuses on monitoring the follow-up of the recommendations resulting from jurisdictions’ stage 1 report.

The OECD is now gathering input for a second round of stage 1 peer reviews, focusing on Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Sweden. As taxpayers are the main users of the MAP, the OECD says their input is key for the review process and so is inviting taxpayers to submit input on specific issues relating to access to MAP, clarity and availability of MAP guidance and the timely implementation of MAP agreements for each of these jurisdictions using an online questionnaire.

Taxpayers should complete the questionnaire and return it to fta.map@oecd.org (in Word format) by 27 February 2017.

The Action 14 peer review taxpayer questionnaire is here.