Slightly insane

nesses that are on the receiving end of these warrants step up to the plate to pay their dues. I wonder about that too and the short answer is: I don’t know either, but I doubt very much that they contribute to our country’s tax revenue.

tively and if you’re not, that minimizes the amount that you receive.”

Furthermore, if parents don’t make sure their taxes are in order before passing, the responsibility falls on the child, due to the law of “inheritance tax”.

CRIB Numbers

As soon as a person is out of school, and either stepping out into the work force or going away to study, it is obligated for them to get a CRIB number.

Who Qualifies to Pay Income Tax

By Hilbert Haar

I have more than once expressed my amazement about the huge number of tax warrants our tax inspectorate issues on a regular basis.

Hundreds of them and they all have one characteristic in common: current residence unknown. So the tax inspectorate knows that it does not know where a certain tax payer is hanging out, but it still insists on issuing tax warrants that contain the order to comply with its contents within two days.

Maybe you wonder how often the people and busi-

The tax inspectorate hit a new low when it issues a tax warrant in January 13 for the Antilliaanse Luchtvaart Maatschappij (Antillean Airways). This shows that our tax collectors are not very good at doing their due diligence, because the ALM went bankrupt more than twenty years ago, in 2002.

Even a simple internetsearch would have told our tax inspectors all they needed to know. The Dutch airline KLM established the ALM on August 1, 1964, as the successor of WestIndisch Bedrijf that closed down in the same year.

Five years later the Netherlands Antilles nationalized the airline and ousted the KLM as its owner.

From January 1, 1969, the airline was renamed ALMAntillean Airlines, but it did not fare well under its new ownership. Corruption within the company and within the Antillean government led the airline to the inevitable abyss.

It still soldiered on for quite some years though and it even acquired St. Maarten’s airline Winair in 1977.

In 1986 neighboring Aruba obtained status aparte within the kingdom and it established its own airline: Air Aruba. It competed on routes the ALM also serviced.

By that time the ALM was already a loss-making company. Eight years before it took over Winair, the KLM had already canceled its cooperation with ALM on the Amsterdam-Curacao route.

After the turn of the century, things went from bad to worse and in September 2001, the ALM entered bankruptcy protection. To no avail: the next year the airline went bankrupt. All this easily obtainable information has apparently escaped the attention of St. Maarten’s tax inspectorate - and that is beyond worrisome. It is, in my opinion at least, slightly insane.

The ALM tax warrant is obviously pointless. The airline has been beyond repair for more than twenty years but unfortunately our local tax inspectorate is not doing much better.

Not only is there a fine to pay, but not having your taxes in order can also hamper your child if they’re thinking of studying abroad. “The child will not get the documents necessary for them to travel. Only when all the taxes have been filed, the child will be able to pursue their scholarship”.

“It’s very important, not only for your child that is studying, it’s also very important for you when you become a pensioner, because you’re paying into the pension system and every year that you file, that gives you a certain amount for you to be able to get the maximum, you would have to be filing consecu-

Persons who receive an income of NAF 24,000+ yearly are qualified to pay income tax. Those who have a yearly income of NAF 18,000 and lower do not pay income tax, but do pay for taxes such as AOV.

Persons who aren’t employed still have to file their taxes by including a letter that explains how they are surviving, and if they were under the care of someone else. If the person was a student before becoming employed, that needs to be stated in the letter.

Small Businesses & Side Hustles

Whether you are selling cakes or doing makeup, all extra income you make needs to be declared. “Officially, by law, all income has to be declared no matter what it may be,” says Natasha, “We live in a technological world now, what we could’ve kept under the rug can’t happen anymore, because everyone is advertising on Facebook and the tax man sees it, and remembers when you go to file.”

Seniors & Income Tax

Seniors don’t necessarily have to pay income tax be- cause they’ve already paid into the system. Seniors who have worked for the government and received a SZV and APNA pension often pay when they paid into the pension fund but there were no taxes deducted out of it at the time.

When the both pensions are added, although it’s not an income, it’s still considered as one because it’s what was received. When added, a person falls into a bracket where taxes need to be paid. And when the senior also receives a rental amount for their apartment, it counts as three incomes, since the amount received for the apartment is 65% taxable.

Located on Backstreet 166, Prudential Tax Services can be contacted for more information and assistance on WhatsApp at 1-721-5874258, 1-721-550-8546 or email info.prudentialsbs@ gmail.com.