FBR field formations start blocking release of refund claims

LAHORE: Field formations of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) have once again started blocking the release of refund claims of taxpayers to meet revenue targets, said sources.

So much so, they said, directions from the office of Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) are also being ignored and manipulated through various whimsical attempts. In most of the cases, they added, the field formations are creating fake demands against taxpayers, which generally surpass the value of refund amounts sought by taxpayers.

It may be noted that the FBR was enthusiastically releasing refund claims in the backdrop of Covid-19 pandemic. However, blocking of such claims has again become norm of the day in the Board.

According to the sources, the intelligence and investigation wing of the Board was acting like a foot soldier of the department as it issues investigation report to start with proceedings for amendment of assessment.

Usually, they added, the assessing officer treats loans obtained by taxpayers as their assets to jumble up the refund claim and all such wrong understandings and treatments of the wealth statements of taxpayers on the part of tax authorities lead to an unending litigation.

The sources said all the explanations and replies furnished by the taxpayer are being turned down and orders for amendment of assessment are being passed one after another. According to the sources, various additions are being made in the assessment order in question to generate a tax demand higher than the disputed amount on the basis of presumption and guesswork on income from unexplained sources.

They pointed out that the assessing officers, in some cases, were found changing the tax liability amounts from lower to higher end arbitrarily simply to entangle taxpayers with unending litigation where filing of appeals, objections to such appeals and adverse orders are being passed to discourage taxpayers from pursuing their claims.

Sources said all such acts of defeating refund claims fall under the definition of maladministration and the business community has been approaching the relevant quarters, including the business associations as well as the forum of FTO for redressal.

It may be noted that the FTO had decided last year to carry out a study on the merger of Alternate Dispute Resolution Committees (ADRCs) with his office to expedite resolution of complaints of taxpayers in future. The Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) was engaged to carry out the study. However, no major breakthrough has been achieved so far on this front.

Business community has a general impression that the ADRCs have failed to redress complaints against tax officers and its effectiveness has become redundant as the number of pending cases has reached to an alarming level. We also face problem in the implementation of decisions of the committee due to non-cooperative attitude of tax machinery, they added.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023