LAHORE: The Pakistan Tax Bar Association (PTBA) has demanded that the chairman of the Federal Board of Revenue should provide a statutory period of 90 days for taxpayers to submit their income tax returns after the Board portal is error-free.
President Rana Munir Hussain and Secretary Ch Qamar Uz Zaman of PTBA, in a letter to chairman FBR, have pointed out that the new IRIS Module 2.0 continuously appears in calculation and frequently encounters data-saving problems.
Most of the time, buttons show unresponsiveness. Due to this, the data entered is lost, which also increases the risk of error and mistakes and taxpayers/tax consultants experience/face a new glitch/problem, which is annoying and badly affecting the timely submission of return forms.
The IRIS module 2.0 has also handicapped the compliant non-resident persons/taxpayers, they said, adding that the non-resident persons are not required to file wealth statements under Section 116 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001.
However, after selecting a non-resident status in the attribute tab, the new IRIS module 2.0 still opens the wealth statement along with the complete data submitted last year, which is illegal. They stressed that the wealth statement needs to be de-attached from the normal return after selecting the non-resident status.
In addition, the new IRIS module 2.0 is wrongly showing and calculating the turnover tax at 1.50% instead of 1.25% in simplified return for manufacturer for individual/AOP having Annual Turnover up to 50 million income tax. It is also wrongly calculating zero tax, where the holding period is 03 to 04 years, against the gain on sales of immovable properties.
According to PTBA leadership, the relevant column for adjustment of refund does not allow the amount of refunds available in previous tax years also in cases where a prescribed refund application has also been submitted.
They said the IRIS portal is calculating/charging the excess/incorrect tax liability on income covered based on fixed/predefined wrong formulas, due to which the taxpayers are bound to pay the high tax instead of their actual tax liability. Besides, it is showing incomplete data on downloading from the MIS tab under various types of tax deductions at source.
Similarly, challan generation of withholding income tax is still in the old system, which is very slow and time-consuming. It also showed a message that “challan/computerized payment receipt does not exist” against the valid CPR duly deposited when a command is given to the system to download CPR.
The PTBA leadership has urged the chairman FBR to look into the matter personally and issue suitable directions to the relevant authorities to ease the tax payers to submit their tax returns for the TY-2023.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
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