Participants of Smart eGovernment conference in Hotel Continental in Belgrade had a chance to see details of successful implantation at Ministry of Finance - Revenue Administration department.

That project of Electronic Tax Filing System in Turkey, officially called VEDOP, was the biggest public IT project in Turkey and has been recognized as one of the most successful project in the last several years.

It has been recognized by many local and international organizations and even won Computer World (USA) Award which is considered Oscar in IT industry.

Achieved numbers which were presented are impressive in every respect, starting from total monetary value of transactions which was 140 Billion USD to number of concurrent users which exceeds 23000 to size of the data base which is growing at the speed of half TB/year.

Revenue Administration department of Turkey was very ambitious from the very beginning of the project but success they achieved probably exceeded their most optimistic expectations.

Since October 2004 more 130 Million tax declaration were received via Web Site and in 2008 percentage of number of eDeclarations for Revenue Administration and corporate tax were coming to almost 100% (99,46% and 99,99% respectively).

Whole project was also recognized as one of the greenest project since it saved more than 6000 tons of paper every year which converted to money means saving of EUR 2.5 million/year only on paper. VEDOP also resulted in saving of personnel effort by saving more than 14000 man-month which means about 3,4 Million EUR/year.

Ministry of Finance recognized that best result would be achieved if they connect Revenue Administration with all other government institution and had connected their system with Banks, Capital market, Insurance, Land office and other institutions in order to exchange all relevant information about tax payer and their behavior.

Achievements were also stunning, for example by comparing of Indebted tax payer and their Bank account information and constrained order government has collected Billions of EUR.

By using Sybase unique vertical data base technology even the most demanding cross analytics and reporting is today at the fingertip of many government employees and crucial tax collection information are very accurate and up to date and enable much more efficient budgeting and planning.

Increase of tax collection and widening of tax base has lead to ability of government to decrease of tax rate which was recognized by public and private sector as even more encouraging and has strengthen their position and gave project necessary credibility to continue even further.

Today Ministry of Finance in Turkey-Revenue Administration department is recognized as one of the most advanced and successful government department in the region and many countries in the region are trying to copy their success.

The Presentation ”Ministry of finance Turkey, Revenue Administration”  (Yasemin Topac – Sybase Turkey) is
available for download here