The tax and customs office in the Netherlands, the Belastingdienst, will begin sending out some 2.6 million letters to people with larger assets and higher wealth who can likely count on receiving compensation. People will receive restitution if they had to pay tax on the Box 3 section of their income tax return for fictitious capital capital gains on assets which they likely did not achieve. It will cost the treasury billions of euros to pay the mandatory compensation.
For years, tax was levied on earnings generated by the capital people held based on a fixed, fictitious rate of return. But many with cash savings did not earn even close to that rate of return, because the interest rate on savings accounts was much lower than the returns that earned from other investments, like stock holdings.
That system was unlawful, the Supreme Court recently ruled. It came with an important legal decision in which it was also stated that many victims are entitled to legal redress. As a result, the Belastingdienst is on the eve of a huge operation to pay back the amount that was unlawfully collected.
The letters, which will begin to go out on Tuesday, will not yet provide instruction about how to claim the compensation which they are owed. The people who are now receiving a letter will receive an invitation in the summer to provide more information per tax year. In the form that they will have to fill out and submit, they will be able to state the actual return achieved during those years. The amount of unfairly paid tax which they may get back will then be calculated.
