The Pakistan Revenue Automation Limited (Pral), a subsidiary of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), has decided to improve all major automation projects, including e-filing and Sales Tax Automated Refund Repository Computer System' (STARR).
Sources said on Wednesday that a meeting, chaired by FBR Chairman Abdullah Yusuf, discussed the projects of Pral and its role in the procurement of Integrated Tax Management System (ITMS). The Pral officials gave a presentation on the basis of observations made by an international consultant on automation. The consultant's report was reviewed in detail.
During the meeting, tax authorities directed the Pral to improve STARR system for speedy payment of sales tax refunds to exporters. It was discussed whether the system has the capability to automatically generate cheques of refunds.
Interestingly, the meeting did not review the progress on allegations of hundreds of ghost employees within Pral. The board had constituted a committee comprising FBR Member Admin and Member Human Resource Management (HRM) to probe the administrative issues including recruitment, promotions and pay packages etc in the Pral.
The committee was required to propose rightsizing and streamlining existing procedure of the organisation. However, it seems that the committee failed to investigate the matter for unknown reasons. It seems that the necessary record has yet not been provided to the investigators.
One of the issues is the detection of ghost employees within the organisation. It has been alleged that nearly 100-150 ghost employees have been drawing salaries from Pral during the last few years. The matter is under investigation, for which the committee has to expedite the proceedings.
Sources said that the committee would conduct audit of the administrative issues to check whether the names of certain employees actually exist or not. It is a serious allegation, which needs to be investigated on top priority basis by the committee. The amount of salaries and benefits taken by these non-existent employees should also be investigated.