''List of White Taxpayers'' renamed

The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has renamed "List of White Taxpayers" as "Active Taxpayers List" with simplified parameters to include maximum taxpayers within the list of complaint taxpayers, regularly filing returns.
Sources told Business Recorder on Sunday that the name of the "List of White Taxpayers" has been replaced with the "Active Taxpayers List" to remove the apprehensions of the business community. A question has been raised whether a taxpayer not covered under the category of "List of White Taxpayers", would be considered as blacklisted company or covered under the so-called "Black List of Taxpayers"? To avoid such kind of wrong interpretation, the name of the "List of White Taxpayers" has been renamed as "Active Taxpayers List".
The FBR has been actively working on simplified criteria so that large number of taxpayers could be covered under the "Active Taxpayers List". The list would be issued to facilitate the regular filers of returns and compliant taxpayers.
A testing of the "List of White Taxpayers" at the Large Taxpayer Unit (LTU), Islamabad showed that out of 1,281 big companies, 39 percent does not fall within the criteria for becoming eligible for "Active Taxpayers List". This showed that the criteria needs to be relaxed for bringing all compliant taxpayers within the category of "Active Taxpayers List". The results of testing have been considered as a warning for the authorities on the status of compliance even among the large companies and big corporate entities. These non-compliance issues would immediately be addressed by the relevant authorities. At least all the taxpayers falling within the jurisdiction of LTUs must be covered under the "Active Taxpayers List". In this regard, the FBR team of experts is refining the criteria for speedy implementation of the "Active Taxpayers List".
It is expected that initially sales tax and corporate income tax returns filers would be covered under the "Active Taxpayers List". The FBR is chalking out mechanism for initial implementation of the "Active Taxpayers List" scheme so that the taxpayers can easily adopt the scheme.
In the first phase, the FBR may only include sales tax filers and corporate income tax filers as part of the "Active Taxpayers List". The "Active Taxpayers List" will become an integrated part of the operational systems-not an informational check only.
Sources said that the FBR is in the process of consultations with taxpayers and their representatives such as business organisations, trade bodies etc for proper use and implementation of "Active Taxpayers List" scheme. The board would also take the input of business community to access the "Active Taxpayers List" keeping in view of their business needs.
During the implementation of the "White List" scheme, the board would ensure that the taxpayers in the list must be those actually required to register, file, and pay taxes. For this purpose, the information system should accurately reflect taxpayers'' situation, sources added.