Latest update November 21st, 2024 1:00 AM
Tax waivers account for bulk of US$14 million loss
… GRA before Parliamentary Committee…
Almost $2.8B, showing as being owed to the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) for goods released in 2006 without the necessary revenues being paid, may largely be for entities that have tax waivers.
This was disclosed on Monday by GRA officials who were questioned on aspects of the 2006 Auditor General’s Report on the entity as they appeared before the Public Accounts Committee.
GRA officials being grilled Monday by the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee.
Under a system called Permission For Immediate Delivery (PID), business entities were allowed to clear their containers and other shipments due to the urgency of the goods.
Entities like the Guyana Defence Force, the Guyana Power and Light Inc. and the Aroaima Mining were some of the major names allowed to receive their goods.
GRA officials, led by its Commissioner-General, Khurshid Sattaur, disclosed that as end of 2009, there were no outstanding payments for PIDs transactions that occurred during that year. This was as a result of heavier scrutiny in various aspects of the Customs and Trade Administration of GRA, the officials stressed.
GRA was heavily grilled over the PID issue especially over the massive amount on its books.
However, Sattaur explained that in most cases businesses would apply for PID, especially with containers with perishables and included aircraft spares, oil and lubricant products.
Goods delivered under PID does not mean that it is not examined. Rather, the necessary checks are made but to facilitate the urgency, they are released pending the documents being submitted and payments made.
There were other instances. One business, Universal Book Store, was said to have 40 plus PID outstanding. The Commissioner-General noted that with Universal, there were magazines and other publications that could not be held back.
The official acknowledged there was a “loose arrangement” in place with this system in 2006 but a solid policy is now in place to remedy that situation. Universal is now in talks with GRA to resolve this situation, he said.
This particular issue is a complex one since Universal would have already sold the publications and would not have passed on the VAT charges to the customers.
Questioning the GRA was the PNCR Winston Murray and Bibi Shadick for the PPP/C members of the PAC.
Last year, to address the issue, GRA had introduced standard operating procedures on how PIDs are now being handled to ensure that the system is not breached.
Questioned over the Customs record keeping, Sattaur said that many of the locations now have filing cabinets. Overtime, the matter was made worse after GRA introduced a rotation system for Customs Officers where systematically they were placed at different locations- all in an effort to reduce corruption.
However, this rotation process created filing problems. While the rotation system helped in easing the corruption, on one hand, it proved problematic to the filing system.
The situation has seen much improvement now and teams from the Internal Audit of GRA have been tasked to carry out periodical inspections to ensure that staffers are toeing the line in maintaining GRA records.
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