The aim of this project was to evaluate the impact of SMS reminders on monthly VAT declarations in Guatemala. The trial involved 107,756 taxpayers with recorded mobile phone numbers, including both small companies and individuals.Three versions of SMS were sent to taxpayers either before or after a monthly deadline. We find that all of the messages sent before the deadline, regardless of the content, were effective at increasing taxpayer declaration rates, with an impact for each message of ~1 percentage point. All messages sent after the deadline were found to have no impact on declaration rates. These findings indicate that the timing of the SMS was more important than the content in this context.
Partner organisation: Superintendencia de Administración Tributaria (SAT) – Guatemalan Tax Authority
