The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has empowered the Director General, Post-Clearance Audit (PCA) to investigate cases of commercial and trade related tax frauds, particularly fiscal frauds, against importers under section 32A of the Customs Act, 1969.
The organisation would have ample powers to maintain National Historical Database (NHD) and traders' profiles and records to properly conduct scrutiny of import related data to check evasion of duties and taxes on clearance of consignments.
The FBR on Monday issued five notifications to give substantial powers to the Director General, Director, Additional Director, Deputy Director, Assistant Director, Principal Appraiser, Senior Auditor and Appraiser/Auditors of the PCA.
According to SRO 1077(I)/2008, the board has established Directorate, Post-Clearance Audit (Headquarters) at FBR House, Islamabad. The territorial jurisdiction of PCA Director General covers all over Pakistan. Under the directorate, the board has established two PCA directors, one each at Karachi and Lahore.
The areas of functional jurisdiction of the DG, PCA, include all imports into and exports from Pakistan, routed and cleared by any cargo clearance system, including temporary imports; all matters including imports, temporary imports of all sorts, including imports under concessionary notifications, DTRE Scheme, transhipment, transit and warehousing; Bulk oil imports; public and private and manufacturing warehouses; export duty drawbacks; ship stores; baggage; Client Accreditation Program (CAP); National Historic Database (NHD); Risk Management System (RMS); Liaison with PRAL or other vendors for preparation, testing and execution of software for effective implementation of PCA at all the customs field formations throughout Pakistan covering all the cargo clearance systems.
He would also be empowered to liaise with donors and all agencies, assisting in settling up and operation of PCA, including Jica expert. The FBR has empowered DG PCA to investigate false statements made by importers and others under section 32 of the Customs Act. He can also exercise power under section 32B (Compounding of offence) under the Customs laws.
The directors and additional directors of the PCA would be empowered to determine customs value of goods under section 25 of Customs Act. They would also be empowered to conduct audit, inquiry or investigation for collecting evidence to check evasion of duties and taxes from any company or organisation.
The directors and additional directors would have access to the business or manufacturing premises, registered office or any other place where any goods, stocks, documents or records relating to the ongoing audit are kept or maintained. They can inspect goods, stocks, documents, records, data, correspondence, accounts, statements, utility bills, bank statements, information regarding nature and sources of funds or assets.
Deputy Director or Assistant Director of the PCA would be empowered to exercise powers under sections 25, 26, 26A, 26B, 32, 32A, 91, 92, 155A, 155B, 155C, 155D, 155L, 155M, 155N, 155O, 155P, 161, 162, 163, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 171, 179, 202 and 211A of the Customs Act, 1969.
Principal appraiser or senior auditor can exercise powers under sections 25, 26, 91, 92, 161, 168, 169 and 171 of the Customs Act. The appraiser or auditor of the PCA would be empowered to exercise sections under section 25, 26, 91, 92, 161, 168, 169 and 171 of Customs Act.
According to Customs General Order (CGO) 13 of 2008, issued on Monday, the objective of the PCA is to develop a comprehensive monitoring mechanism to verify the correctness of trade related declarations; detect, investigate and propose measures to prevent commercial and trade related Frauds. It would assist the FBR to evolve, develop and update systems, procedures and organisational structures meant to scrutinise and ensure compliance of the trade with the national trade laws, procedures and controls; and recover escaped revenues.
Under the organisational structure, the DG, PCA, will have at least three Directors ie Director, Lahore, Director, Karachi and Director (Headquarters), Islamabad, or as many Directors as the Board may determine from time to time. The Director General (PCA) shall report to the Member (Customs), FBR.
In case of the goods cleared from any of Collectorate in Karachi, Hyderabad and Quetta, the function of PCA shall be performed by Director, PCA, Karachi. In case of goods cleared from Lahore, Rawalpindi, Multan, Faisalabad, Sialkot and Peshawar, the function of PCA shall be performed by Director, PCA, Lahore. The PCA (Directorate General Office), Islamabad, would have the mandate to establish, update and operate records, databases and profiles covering all aspects of trade and business.
It would evolve a proactive monitoring mechanism to ensure compliance with national trade laws, rules, procedures, controls, restrictions, prohibitions, etc and set up mechanism and machinery along with its ancillary and auxiliary sub-systems for audit, intelligence, investigation, prosecution, adjudication, dispute resolution and recovery proceedings.
The relevant Directorate of PCA at Karachi and Lahore will serve as operations headquarters for PCA activities in the specified area including data analysis, risk assessment and selection of sectors/cases for generating the work orders for the PCA and monitoring of the follow up actions.
The relevant Director, PCA will assign the audits to the PCA officers, supervise and monitor progress of the audit cases and take all necessary measures to ensure that the audit activities are conducted fairly, transparently and in accordance with the law and the prescribed procedures as are laid down in Pakistan Customs PCA Manual.