On 23 February 2015, Swiss Federal councillor Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf and the Italian finance minister Pier Carlo Padoan signed a deal in Milan to fight tax evasion. This deal marks the end of years of controversy and brings the double taxation agreement (DTA) between the two countries into compliance with OECD standards, in particular the rules relating to the sharing of information.
The new DTA also means Italian tax residents with undeclared Swiss bank accounts can now benefit from Italy’s recent voluntary disclosure programme that allows tax evaders to come clean by declaring undeclared assets and paying retrospective taxes.
Map showing Campione d’Italia
Other changes include how Italian cross-border workers working in Switzerland are taxed. Currently all tax is paid in Switzerland with 38.8% of it later forwarded by the Swiss tax office to the worker’s commune of residence in Italy. Under the new system, to be finalised by the middle of 2015, the same cross-border worker will make two separate tax payments. One to the Swiss tax office and one to the Italian tax authorities.
Improvements will also be made to specific aspects of indirect taxes in Campione d’Italia, a small enclave of Italy encircled by Switzerland near Lugano, which was founded in the first century BC by the Romans as a garrison town to fend off Helvetti invasions.
