ISLAMABAD: The latest number of income tax return filers as per the Active Taxpayers List (ATL) now stands at over 4 million and may touch even 4.5 million mark.

Tax expert Asif S Kasbati, PBC Core Tax Committee & ICAP Fiscal Laws Committee Member informed that the FBR data revealed Income Tax ATL status for the Tax Year 2022 stood at over 4 million as on June 27, 2023. However, it is expected the ATL figure would reach 4.5 million by September 30.

When discussing the matters with Asif S Kasbati, he highlighted that the ATL for Tax Year (TY) 2018 reached 1.8 million, while increased to 2.4 million for TY 2019. For TY 2020, it was 2.9 million on September 20, 2022.

ATL: number of return filers hits 3.58m mark

Kasbati added that the ATL for the Tax Year 2021, released on December 12, 2022, had 3.83 million taxpayers and considering the historical monthly progress, he estimated the figure at 4 million by February 28, 2023.

The senior tax consultant recalled that FBR had committed to register 300,000 new taxpayers, which has been declared as an unrealistic figure by certain professionals.

However, as per Kasbati analysis, for tax year 2022 there would be 4.5 million taxpayers on the ATL as compared to 4 million in 2021, reflecting a remarkable increase from last year. His prediction is based on the average progressive ratio of 3% per month.

However, FBR can achieve the target of 4.5 million taxpayers earlier on the ATL through broadening the tax base process by data mining of Withholding

Taxes, coordination with NADRA, Provincial Revenue Authorities for Properties & Motor Vehicles, bringing maximum Non-Tier 1 traders into tax net, etc.

Kasbati opined several people file return just to be in ATL, without paying much income tax, hence, FBR has to analyse how may taxpayers are actually paying taxes. He recalled that few years ago, FBR was publishing “Income Tax Filer Directory with Tax Paid by each taxpayer”, which was good for Transparency.

The Directory may be published for Tax Years 2021 and 2022, he added.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023