Have you ever been unnecessarily worried about your finances and whether the tax office will find out that you sold the bike and did not declare your income? Or are you renting an apartment and worrying about what needs to be declared or not? Does the tax office know about my transactions in my bank account?
Once my Estonian language tutor (yes, I don’t know him perfectly, and it was a long time ago) asked, but what will happen if all the children in the class transfer 5 euros to my account for a trip-excursion. Do I have to declare income and suddenly someday a tax inspector will come to me with additional questions? This question made me smile, let's see why.
Common myth
Firstly, banks do not transfer your information to the tax office without your knowledge. They have no legal right to do so. Although, to be honest, you need to keep a very good track of all the agreements that you give when signing documents or filing petitions. For example, in the latest versions, I saw how the applications began to indicate the fields about your desire to automatically transfer data to the tax office. So, I do not advise you to check the consent box there, because in this case, the banks will really begin to share information. But, in general, no one has the right to share what is happening on your account without your consent.
Now about the case with money from third parties. Believe me, no one is interested in these microtransactions, there are much more problems in the world than tracking what happened on your individual account. If you say that this is money to collect something somewhere, then it will be so. But, believe me, no one will ask you about this.
About the Estonian tax system
Thirdly, Estonia has an incredibly democratic tax and customs department system. The system is built on honest trust in you as a citizen of the country. If you said that you are not renting an apartment, then it is so and it doesn’t matter that every month you receive payments on your account with a description of üür. Plus, even if you accidentally did not declare income, then no penalties apply to you, except for those that you must pay the same unpaid tax. The Tax and Customs Department operates automatic verification of declarations and the verification takes place at the expense of other systems and other declarations of companies where, for example, you work-worked and received income). If contradictions are found there, then the declaration is manually processed. But even in her case, a tax specialist often calls and simply asks you about the discrepancy, and most likely the employer should make changes or you just correct the line in the declaration.
Therefore, regarding taxes, if you live in Estonia, then you are lucky to have one of the most democratic and transparent tax systems here.