Hi everyone,

Stupid question.
Can someone explain what exactly is meant with "Zinsen von Sparkapitalien" in the tax declaration and why this is categorized as a deductible in the same section as Insurance premiums?
Are we taking about the gross/net interests on bank accounts here?
And if yes I don't understand why this is deductible since it's an earning and not a spending...

Thanks a lot

Can't answer the whys of it but yes, it is the interest earned on your bank accounts. Each of them should have sent you a statement, probably back in January, with the account's closing balance on 31.21.20xx and also the total interest earned for that year. You need to include those statements with your tax return as well as copy the numbers from them into the "Wertschriftverzeichnis".

I believe the OP is talking about a question on the Insurance Premiums page, I always left this blank. Line 604 on a ZH tax return

The reason for the deductibility of interest earned on savings is because savings represent a form of self-insurance.

"Weil das Banksparen eine Form der Selbstvorsorge darstellt, sind auch die (steuerbaren) Zinsen auf Sparkapitalien abziehbar."

http://www.swiss-tax.ch/SE_Abzuege.htm

Yes, quite. And then the total from the interest column in the "Wertschriftverzeichnis" (sorry, no idea how to translate this! It's the page where you list all your bank accounts) gets transferred to the insurance premiums worksheet.

On my tax forms (canton GL), anywhere they want you to copy an entry from one page to another, you will see fine print next to the "destination" space to tell you where the number should come from. Perhaps the ZH ones are the same.


FMF, did you ever look to see whether the tax office adjusted your returns to include that line? They can be quite helpful like that sometimes (or at least the ones out here in deepest Glarnerland can be). The first few times around, I left an "account administration fees" deduction entry blank as I wasn't totally sure what to put there - and the tax office filled it in for me. Last year I deliberately didn't take all my usual work-related deductions (I was employed but in practice was off work nearly the entire year due to pregnancy/maternity) - even wrote a note explaining why not - and they wrote back to say they'd assigned me the deductions anyway!

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....use e-taxes and you will probably find the software does it automatically (at least it does in SG).

No they did not, however my interest received was tiny as I hold very little cash. I used ZH Private tax software to complete my return.