Authenticating exemption certificates: FBR urged to withdraw power of terminal operators

All Pakistan Customs Agents Association (APCAA) has demanded the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to withdraw the power of authenticating exemption certificates from terminal operators in order to eliminate malpractices. Talking to Business Recorder, Arshad Jamal, spokesman and senior vice chairman APCAA, said that the association had convened agenda meetings with the collectors from East, West and Port Qasim Collectorates last month where they had stressed upon the withdrawal of unnecessary examination and assessment procedures to improve the clearance time of consignments.
He said that the APCAA always tried to facilitate the FBR for revenue generation and added that Collectorates and terminals should take initiatives to reduce the cost of doing business, which he hoped would help the department for regaining taxpayers' confidence.
Arshad lamented that the FBR did not take the stakeholders on board before enforcing new procedures, raising disenchantment among the stakeholders.
"No strategy has so far been drafted to distinguish filers and non-filers and the names of taxpayers or stakeholders, who receive notices from the FBR, are positioned in non-filer list without giving them a chance to respond against the notices".
Consequently, the taxpayers or stakeholders are compelled to pay excessive demurrages and detention for their consignments. The APCAA therefore suggested the FBR to evolve standard operating procedure (SOP) to resolve the said problem being faced by the stakeholders.
Commenting on certificates verification issue, which is not only creating problems for the taxpayers but also earning bad name for the FBR, Arshad said that exemption certificates, procedural certificates and several ministries certificates were required for consignments clearance and the FBR had made terminal operators responsible for the verification of these certificates.
He said that the APCAA had requested the authority concerned to withdraw this power from terminals as they were neither public-owned entities nor these terminals had skilled-workforce for certificates' verification.
Moreover, Arshad said that the APCAA in order to avert the misuse of certificates verification power suggested the board to establish Certificates Verification Cell (CVC) where goods declarants submitted relevant certificates after filing goods declarations (GD) while the customs staff should be responsible to add the verified certificates with the GDs of the taxpayers through system.
Then, these verified certificates would be forwarded to appraisers and assessment officers, who would then be allowed to remove 'Hold' status and clear the consignments.
Presently, the taxpayers despite clearing their consignments after the completion of all procedures are compelled to fulfil separate procedure to remove the "Hold" status for consignments clearance.
Arshad also claimed that the APCAA was working on the SOP to ensure swift consignments clearance through short and comprehensive procedure, which would shortly be presented to the authority concerned for implementation.
The APCAA further demanded the FBR to take all stakeholders on board before enforcing any new procedure as it would ensure its successful implementation through prolific stakeholders' feedback.