As an important part of the import and export business activities of enterprises, customs planning should have at least the following characteristics.
1. Legality
Legality means that customs planning can only be carried out within the scope permitted by the Customs Law. The Customs Law is a legal norm that regulates the relationship between customs and import and export enterprises, and the tax collection relationship is the most basic economic relationship between customs and import and export enterprises. In the legal relationship of tax collection, the customs responsible for tax collection must collect taxes according to law, and import and export enterprises as taxpayers must also pay taxes according to law. If an enterprise violates the provisions of the Customs Law and evades taxes, the result of its behavior will only be legal sanctions and it will bear administrative or criminal liability. Under the premise of legality, when there are multiple tax payment options to choose from, the enterprise can choose a plan with a low tax burden.
2. Advancement
Advancement means that customs planning behavior is advanced compared to the import and export business behavior of enterprises. Enterprises pay customs duties and value-added tax only after import and export activities occur. Since customs laws and regulations are in place first, enterprises can arrange and adjust their import and export affairs in advance based on known customs laws and regulations and related tax preferential policies and customs clearance supervision systems to carry out customs planning, choose the best tax payment plan and customs clearance plan, and strive for their own maximum interests. In other words, customs planning must be carried out before the import and export business activities of the enterprise occur. If the business activities have been determined and taxes are evaded or owed, it can only be tax evasion, not customs planning.
3. Comprehensiveness
Comprehensiveness means that customs planning should focus on the long-term and stable growth of the overall capital income of the enterprise, rather than just focusing on the level of tax burden of individual taxes. From a small perspective, the eyes of the enterprise cannot only focus on the level of tax burden of individual taxes. In addition to considering tax factors, customs clearance issues must also be considered. Only by considering multiple factors as a whole can we seek benefits and avoid harm, make comprehensive decisions, and achieve the goal of maximizing overall benefits.
4. Purposefulness
Purposefulness means that the motivation of customs planning is to reduce tax expenditure and obtain tax saving benefits. In practice, the tax saving benefits of enterprises are obtained from two aspects. On the one hand, it is to choose a tax plan with low tax burden or overall profit maximization. Low tax burden means low tax cost, and low tax cost means high capital recovery rate. On the other hand, it is to defer tax payment time. The deferral of tax payment time here does not refer to the behavior of not paying taxes within the time limit prescribed by the tax law, but refers to striving for tax deferral within the scope permitted by the Customs Law. The deferral of tax payment time is equivalent to the enterprise obtaining an interest-free loan from the government equal to the deferred tax during the deferral period. The deferral of tax payment time can also reduce the actual tax expenditure of the enterprise in an inflationary environment. The result is the saving of corporate tax payment.