In Australia we could have the worst system in the world -
we have provisional tax - you are sent an invoice for tax
money on earnings before you have even earned the money.
If you don't pay, the tax dept can even raid your bank account.
It's outrageous, as many times the estimate is wrong too and
you still have to pay but then claim a refund up to 9 months later.
It looks like many other countries have similar policies?

It hit me a few times many years ago as a wage earner with savings.
I even heard of small businesses going out of business
because they didn't have the money to pay the tax
and were already so far in debt that they couldn't even
borrow the money to pay the tax.
So effectively the tax dept ran them out of business and
destroyed their company over money that didn't exist.
It happened because they had one good year where their tax bill was high
but the Govt. never allowed for the fact that they were having a bad year.

I think it's even worse than Robodebt where estimates were made
from previous earnings with no regard to current earnings.
I wonder why there is no similar class action?

So they went out of business because they had a good year?

freediver wrote on Oct 14^th, 2022 at 7:49am:

So they went out of business because they had a good year?

Yes - that's right.
A business needs "float" money to stay in business.
If the tax Dept. freezes the business bank account then
the business must close - the workers must be sacked and
all because of a tax debt that was false.
I wonder if such a business could sue the Tax Dept?

A tax Dept. invoice -
the only invoice you get with no purchase order number.

That's terrible that a business could fail despite being managed so well.

freediver wrote on Oct 14^th, 2022 at 5:35pm:

That's terrible that a business could fail despite being managed so well.

It's terrible.
I know someone who had a provisional tax invoice despite
not having a single sale for that year.
Their business had basically ceased anyway.