FPCCI urges settlement of pending audit cases

KARACHI: Irfan Ahmed Sarwana, acting president of the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI), on Friday said 200,000 audit cases pending settlement should be settled by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).

“In spite of finance minister’s assurance, the claims of the RPOs issued before April 2017 have not been paid yet,” he said, when Seema Shakeel, chief commissioner, Inland Revenue, Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU), Karachi, visited the FPCCI.

He said there was continuous decline in exports from $25 billion in 2014 to less than $20 billion in 2017 due to various hurdles, including high cost of production of indigenous goods. Delay in payment of refund claims caused liquidity crunch and therefore, exporters were compelled to take loan at high mark-up rate to meet orders in time, Sarwana added.

The acting chief of FPCCI said when nil sales tax return filers such as exporters, sole distributors etc, claimed their refunds, as a penalty they were served with audit notices to discourage them. He proposed to dispose-off the audit within a stipulated time frame as over 200,000 audit cases were pending settlement.

Referring to the complicated and cumbersome procedure of sales tax registration (STR) and deregistration, he proposed that traders should be temporarily registered within seven days of filing their application. “However, the tax officials may continue the verification process at their end and may revoke such provisionally issued STR certificates if verification report is not favourable,” he added.

Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP) former chief executive SM Muneer said the Federal board of Revenue (FBR) only knows collecting taxes and does not facilitate the taxpayers. He said due to high cost of doing business in Pakistan, the industrial sector was gradually depleting. He urged the LTU chief commissioner to issue exemption certificates within the same day.

LTU chief commissioner Seema Shakeel advised taxpayers to resolve their issue directly with tax authorities instead of going for unnecessary litigations, “as tax officials are available to guide taxpayers in resolving their issues.” 

Regarding consulting the concerned trade body before raid on the business premises she said, “It is difficult to apprise the trade body of raids due to confidentiality of the matter.” STR was grossly misused for obtaining bogus refunds in the past, however, she appreciated the proposal of granting temporary registration of sales tax.