After swimming pools, house extensions. The tax authorities will again bet on their artificial intelligence software to track down undeclared constructions. The verandas are in particular targeted, entrusted to the Parisian Antoine Magnant, Deputy Director General of the Directorate General of Public Finances (DGFiP). “But we have to be sure that the software will be able to find buildings with large footprints and not the doghouse or the children’s hut,” he explains.
The hunt for undeclared swimming pools using this tool will already bring in 10 million euros for the tax authorities in one year. However, the system was only deployed in 9 departments in October 2021. Its generalization should therefore further inflate the coffers of the tax administration.
Building on this success, the tax authorities therefore plan to target extensions from now on. But the software, which takes aerial views and compares them to cadastral data, is not yet ready. The DGFiP would be aware of this necessary improvement before launching a possible experiment. And thus avoid a controversy if ever a terrace is mistaken for a veranda…
If the tool becomes reliable, many undeclared constructions could be identified: from the garden shed to the box for cars through the pergola. To be affected by the property tax, this equipment must be “permanently fixed to the ground”, recalls Le Parisien.
Antoine Magnant ensures that this device can also prove beneficial for certain taxpayers. Especially those who continue to pay property tax for abandoned buildings. “In many places in France, you have sets with a house and two or three ruined buildings around it that are in the name of the owners,” he explains. Cases which should still be largely in the minority.
