SAP S/4HANA implementation - an opportunity for the tax department

Rethinking processes, structures and systems. The changeover to SAP S/4HANA brings major changes for many companies. If the tax department is integrated into the implementation, there are good opportunities to tackle various topics in a completely new way and to optimise processes holistically across all business processes. This is also advantageous in terms of tax compliance. In our white paper "SAP S/4HANA - An opportunity for the tax department", our experts get to the bottom of the issues involved.

One example is data capture. With SAP S/4HANA, companies can fundamentally restart and modernise processes here. Until now, many tax departments have tolerated errors at the beginning of a process and then corrected them later. Now, workflows can be reorganised in such a way that errors and therefore costly corrections are eliminated as far as possible from the outset. However, this requires the necessary information and data. SAP S/4HANA will be able to provide significantly more information automatically in many areas than we are familiar with from today's R3 systems.

In the white paper, our experts analyse how the introduction of SAP S/4HANA affects the processing of different types of tax (income tax, withholding tax, transfer pricing and VAT). In the area of income tax, for example, the possibilities for automation have not yet been fully utilised in most companies. The greatest potential here lies in the recording of incoming documents. With a view to SAP S/4HANA migration, the aim should be to capture data at the beginning of the process (master data, purchase requisition, contract negotiations, invoice entry, etc.) and thus make it available for tax purposes. This avoids subsequent searches for data, figures and factual information. This leaves tax departments with more time for value-adding activities. At the same time, transmission errors are avoided. As a result, compliance costs are reduced while compliance quality increases.

The successful introduction and subsequent use of SAP S/4HANA depends above all on early and intensive engagement with the topic. The earlier the tax department can be involved and define its requirements, the better. For all tax types, it is important to provide data at the required level of detail very early on in the process. This is the only way to prevent the subsequent, time-consuming correction of insufficient or incorrect data. The potential for simplification and automation identified should be systematically identified in an implementation project and then subjected to a cost-benefit analysis. This ensures, among other things, that the implementation costs are amortised with a corresponding return on investment.