FBR, provinces sign MoU on single sales tax return portal

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue and all the four provincial revenue authorities signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for a single sales tax return and single web portal on Wednesday.

Signing of the MoU is one of the most significant components of harmonisation of sales tax initiative currently underway between the Federation and the provinces, says a press release.

On the behalf of FBR, the MoU was signed by chairman FBR whereas the heads of all the provincial revenue authorities signed the document on behalf of their respective departments.

The representatives of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Revenue Authority (KPRA) and Balochistan Revenue Authority (BRA) were physically present in the ceremony whereas the representatives of Sindh Revenue Board (SRB) and Punjab Revenue Authority (PRA) participated virtually through zoom.

Addressing on the occasion, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Revenue Dr Waqar Masood Khan said that signing of the document was another step towards completion of the prime minister’s vision to make FBR fully automated. “This step will bring facilitation for taxpayers and it will help a great deal in improving the country’s position on Ease of Doing Business Index,” he added.

The SA to PM on Revenue further added that now persons associated with businesses would only have to file one sales tax return instead of many returns. He further said that this step would help bring simplification in tax system and procedure.

Meanwhile, Sindh Revenue Board (SRB) Chairman Wasif Memon said that the business community would get a big facility after the introduction of One Window. The One Window would be formed under the National Tax Council.

He said that work was being carried out on One Window to collect sales tax, agriculture income tax, social security, excise duty, motor vehicle tax, infrastructure tax, professional tax and workers welfare tax under one roof in Sindh.

While answering a question, Wasif Memon said that significant increase was noted in the tax revenue with the implementation of Point of Sales (PoS) system on restaurants in Sindh and till now this system was imposed on 196 restaurants and being expanded to other business points.

He said that food streets of the city will also be brought into the tax net. He said that the ratio of sales tax in Sindh was 13 percent, which is low as compared to other provinces of the country.