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Its first hackathon will be held from September 2 to 4
Singapore is ramping up its Smart Nation initiative; several government bodies such as the Ministry of Manpower and IDA have been holding hackathons to accelerate innovation in their respective industries.
Now, Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) wants to be the latest government entity to jump on the disruption train.
It is holding a hackathon in conjunction with the UP Singapore movement from September 2 to 4 to boost the creation of tech-enabled solutions to streamline tax administration services for SMEs and other taxpayers. Participants need to have at least a team of 3.
Before that, it will be holding a pre-hackathon workshop on August 30 for participants to learn about and explore the opportunity areas.
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Then, on August 31, IRAS will be holding tech workshop organised by Microsoft. Participants will be exposed to Microsoft Azure platform and tools, and topics relevant to this hackathon, including APIs and AI / chatbots.
The three opportunity areas it wishes to explore are:
Delivering services that cater to taxpayers’ queries
Taxpayers find it difficult to navigate through IRAS’s huge database of information. There need to be tools to help both taxpayers and tax professionals gather accurate research on tax rules quickly.
For the less tech-savvy taxpayers, IRAS also wants solutions that can provide better digital assistance.
Anticipating taxpayers’ needs
IRAS wants to leverage on current technology such as Artificial Intelligence to help create customised solutions that can cater and anticipate each taxpayers’ unique needs such as rebates, language, and concessions.
It also wants Big data solutions to help government bodies such as Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) and Statistics Singapore to develop business insight services to benefit businesses at each stage.
Integration with taxpayers’ existing systems
Integrating tax preparation with taxpayers’ existing business systems such as payroll or accounting would go a long way in helping them file their tax returns efficiently and accurately.
IRAS is also looking for better ways to streamline the storing and gathering of tax information such as deductions and tax reliefs during the tax filing season.
For more information on the hackathon, click here.
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Image Credit: Businesstimes.sg
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