5 minute read 24 Jan 2024

The Indonesian Government issued regulation No 58/2023 (Government Regulation 58, “GR 58”) and the related implementing regulation, i.e. Minister of Finance regulation No 168/2023 (“MoF 168”) in relation to the Tax Rate for Withholding Income tax Art 21/26 (“WHT 21”). 

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Effective Tax Rates for Employee Withholding Tax under Article 21 of the Income Tax Law

Authors
Nathanael Albert W

Partner, Global Compliance & Reporting, PSS Consult

Mindful of client’s needs. Balance seeker, yet growth focus. Yoga and gym enthusiast.

Kartina Indriyani

Partner, People Advisory Services, PSS Consult

Committed to embrace positive diversity and support women development in business and society. Fashion enthusiast.

5 minute read 24 Jan 2024
Related topics Tax Workforce

In December 2023, the Indonesian Government issued regulation No 58/2023 (Government Regulation 58, “GR 58”) and the related implementing regulation, i.e. Minister of Finance regulation No 168/2023 (“MoF 168”) in relation to the Tax Rate for Withholding Income tax Art 21/26 (“WHT 21”). The regulations are effective from 1 January 2024.

The purpose of these regulations is to simplify the calculation of monthly WHT 21/26 by the employer/payer of income related to work, services, and activities.  In essence, a simplified approach is used for salary/wages withholding for eleven months, with a ‘true-up’ in the December period, such that there is accurate withholding for the year.

Key aspects of GR 58 and MoF 168 are:

  • The government introduced an effective tax rate (Tarif Efektif Rata-rata, “TER”) to calculate monthly WHT 21 for the period of January to November (or the month before the last working period). The TER is applied on the income for the respective month.
  • The tax calculation for December (or the last working period of the employee) still uses the progressive tax rates on the total annual income after deducting the allowable deductions. Therefore, the use of TER does not change the total annual tax liability compared to previous WHT 21 calculation method.
  • There are different TERs for employees who are paid on monthly basis and for individual workers paid on a daily basis.
  • Monthly TERs are from 0% to 34%, calculated based on monthly gross income and categorized based on the marital status and dependent as of the beginning of tax year, detail as shown below:
  • Daily TER is applied for non-permanent employee and calculated based on daily gross income that refers to daily or weekly wages.
  • The list of Monthly TER and Daily TER is attached.
  • “Zakat” or religious donation which is mandatory by religions acknowledged by the Indonesian governments is considered as allowable deduction for the WHT 21 calculation as long as it is paid through the employer to the religious institution authorized by the government.  
  • Annualization of income is still required for an employee who starts their Indonesian tax residency after 1 January or ends their Indonesian tax residency before 31 December.  The annualization is now only will be done in calculating in December or in the last working period.
  • If the total monthly tax withheld prior to the last tax period is higher than the total annual tax liability, employers must return the over tax withheld to the employee, along with providing the form 1721 A1. As for the employers, the overpayment could be carried forward to the next periods of WHT 21 monthly tax return.
  • The employee is required to report all income, including the non-tax object income on their individual income tax return. In relation to this, employers would need to provide information of non-tax object income i.e., exempted Benefit in Kind(“BIK”) to the employees. 
  • The WHT 21 calculation for non-employees and ex-employees has also changed. The change is mainly that the income as the basis to calculate WHT 21 is not the accumulated income paid by the payor, but only income paid in the respective month.

Impact on employers and next steps

Employers will need to modify their payroll calculation processes and systems to accommodate the changes and it is suggested that the company to socialize this with employees. The changes to monthly tax calculation mechanisms using the estimated effective tax rates will impact the monthly take home pay of employees that are paid on gross basis, compared to what they use to receive prior to introduction of the TER.  Companies may need to communicate the changes in advance to address this and to ensure seamless transition to the new method. 

As mentioned above, there is no overall additional tax burden or increase of tax liability for the employee as the result of the changes on WHT21 calculation.  However, it is most likely that the TER mechanism adopted on the monthly WHT21 will have impact on the final amount of WHT 21 calculated either at the year end or at the end of employment. There may be some potential scenarios leading to over-deduction of WHT21 resulting from the TER method.

For Zakat or mandatory religion donation, as the deductibility requires the payment to be made by employer, companies may need to set up a process to facilitate the payment of Zakat.

With regard to the implementation of tax on BIK under the Government Regulation Number 55 Year 2022 (“GR 55”) and Minister of Finance Regulation Number 66 Year 2023 (“MoF 66”), employers need to make sure that such BIK components are also included as part of the gross income in the monthly TER WHT21 calculation.  In this regard, for employee’s tax reporting purposes companies may need to set up a process to compile the data of BIK provided to employees - both the taxable and non-taxable BIK.  Note that as per MoF 66, for corporate income tax purposes, companies need to maintain a list of BIK provided to employees.

EY will continue to monitor the developments on employee withholding tax regulations. If you have any questions, we encourage you to contact one of our Tax Professionals.

TER for WHT 21 based on GR-58/2023

Monthly TER

TER A = S/O, S/1 and M/O

TER B = S/2 & M/1; S/3 & M/2

TER C = M/3

Daily TER

Summary

The purpose of these regulations is to simplify the calculation of monthly WHT 21/26 by the employer/payer of income related to work, services, and activities. EY will continue to monitor the developments on employee withholding tax regulations. If you have any questions, we encourage you to contact one of our Tax Professionals.

About this article

Authors
Nathanael Albert W

Partner, Global Compliance & Reporting, PSS Consult

Mindful of client’s needs. Balance seeker, yet growth focus. Yoga and gym enthusiast.

Kartina Indriyani

Partner, People Advisory Services, PSS Consult

Committed to embrace positive diversity and support women development in business and society. Fashion enthusiast.

Related topics Tax Workforce