TOKYO: The number of people in Japan who filed their 2019 tax returns via smartphone stood at some 470,000, up 3.6-fold from the preceding year, National Tax Agency data showed Friday.

Including those who conducted tax return procedures on personal computers, the number of people who filed tax returns from home for the year using the "e-Tax" system totaled some 1.95 million.

Meanwhile, the number of people who visited tax offices for such procedures dropped about 10 percent to a record low of 3,814,000.

Beginning with procedures for 2019, tax return filling via smartphone became available for all salaried workers, with this apparently leading to the increase in online filing. The online method was popular also because many people refrained from visiting tax offices amid restraints on going out due to the novel coronavirus outbreak, sources said.

The total number of people who filed tax returns for 2019 stood at about 22.04 million, down 0.8 percent year on year. The combined income of some 6.3 million people who needed to pay income tax fell 1.2 percent to 41,614 billion yen, and they declared a total of 3,217.6 billion yen in tax payments, down 2 percent.

The declared amount of consumption tax grew 2.2 percent to 606.2 billion yen, the highest level since the levy was introduced in 1989, partly on the back of the 2-percentage-point hike in the tax rate to 10 percent in October 2019.

JIJI Press