Digitalising the tax department

Digitalisation and its associated changes, opportunities and risks have long been a frequently discussed topic across all areas of tax law. The use of digital technologies and capabilities is becoming increasingly important. It is important to keep an eye on developments and to find solutions tailored to your own business entity.

Read our free study paper to find out about the status quo of digitalisation in German tax departments. The results of our survey of tax managers from more than 120 business entities provide insight into several aspects:

• How is the tax department’s role changing within a business entity?
• How well are tax departments positioned with regard to digitalisation?
• How important is a strategic approach?
• What impact does digitalisation have on the technology landscape and tax processes?
• What technologies come into play? What is the potential for artificial intelligence, robotics, blockchain and the like?
• What is the status of SAP S/4HANA adoption?

Thank you to the study participants from business entities of different sizes and industries.

• Tax managers are pursuing a new role for their tax department: Still often a central department/compliance department today, they want to become more of a business partner and value creator in the business entity, actively helping to shape business changes.
• They are also counting on the increasing digitalisation of the tax function, but believe that there is some catching up to do compared to the business entity overall.
• Digitalisation efforts require a strategic approach in line with the overall business entity’s digitalisation strategy.
• Currently, Microsoft Excel is the most important software used in tax departments - but for the future, tax managers are placing more emphasis on lesser-used technologies such as workflow, data analysis and visualization tools, as well as process automation.
• The degree of digitalisation of tax processes varies between tax types, from income tax to customs duties.
• Even today, the technology solutions used are often at least partially interconnected.
• The expertise and the willingness of employees to change are key to the success of the digitalisation strategy.
• More and more, tax tasks are being outsourced.

We are happy to provide you with the detailed results. Download “Digitalising the tax department” for free here.