Taxpayers and tax consultants are reportedly facing immense difficulties in e-filing of income tax returns and statements, due to malfunctioning of IRIS system. According to details, IRIS system has not been working properly since Monday morning, putting the taxpayers and tax practitioners in an uncertain state as the deadline to e-file the returns is on October 31, 2016 (today).
Although the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has initiated SMS campaign, intimating the taxpayers to file returns as soon as possible to avoid facing any difficulty due to excessive burden on system during the last days, a large number of taxpayers are still unable to e-file returns due to technical difficulties.
Pakistan Tax Bar Association (PTBA) and Karachi Tax Bar Association (KTBA) through separate letters elaborated technical difficulties in e-filing of returns and statements. They requested the board to extend the date of e-filing of returns till November 30, 2017.
They said that various amendments and fundamental changes were made from time to time even after the introduction of income tax return and wealth statement forms 2017, which were finalized and uploaded on the web-portal IRIS system through final SRO no. 981(1)/2014 September 28, 2017 after the deadline of the tax returns ie August 31, 2017 and almost 2 days earlier the deadline of September 30, 2017.
In addition, the final SRO in respect of corporate tax return for the tax year 2017 was also issued very late, ie, on the September 28, 2017, which was also due to be e-filed on September 30, 2017. As such the date was extended up to the 31st October, 2017.
Furthermore, the prescribed time granted under section 118 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001 for e-filing of the tax return along with wealth statement form for the taxpayers fell under the FTR and salaried class is August 31 - two months from the date the tax return was due, ie, July 1 of every year and for business individuals and non-FTR, the prescribed time available under the statute was three months, ie, September 30 of every year.
Therefore, it is a matter of deep concern for the taxpayers that the prescribed time available under the ordinance to prepare and e-file of the tax return and wealth statement was not provided, hence it is not only impossible to complete the task but also illegal and unjustified as per the provisions of the ordinance.
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