Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) would launch a pilot testing of Real-time Invoice Monitoring System (RIMS) on hotels/restaurants in Islamabad having sales turnover of Rs.5 million and above in the first week of January 2018 to monitor sales and collect sales tax.

On successful operation of pilot testing, the coverage of RIMS would be extended to all hotels/restaurants in the federal capital. However, hotels/restaurants with a sales turnover of less than Rs.5 million would not be covered by RIMS. This was disclosed by Mr. Mustafa Sajjad Hassan, Chief Commissioner, Regional Tax Office, Islamabad while addressing business community at Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Ms. Ayesha Farooq Commissioner RTO, Zaheer Qureshi Chief Sales Tax and Engr. Iftikhhar Ali SPM (Punjab & KP) from PRAL also accompanied him. At the occasion, a detailed presentation on web-based RIMS was given to the business community.

Mustafa Sajjad Hassan said that the purpose of web-based RIMS was to reduce the interface between FBR and taxpayers and said that gradually other sectors of the economy would also be covered by such IT based systems to monitor sales and collect sales tax. He said business community should not be afraid of RIMS as it would facilitate them and reduce their interaction with FBR officials. He was hopeful that the improvement in sales tax collection would lead to further reduction in its rates.

He said FBR technical team was ready to provide training to the technical staff of restaurants for operation of RIMS. He assured that no sales tax audit would be done of the restaurants covered by RIMS. He further assured that on launch of RIMS, any bugs faced by the business community, would be removed by the FBR technical team.

Speaking at the occasion, Sheikh Amir Waheed, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry said that the launch of RIMS should be started from non-taxpayers and its coverage should be gradually extended to other restaurants in a period of 3-4 months. He said all new IT based system should be introduced in consultation with business community to reduce the element of harassment and implementation of such system should be across the board without any discrimination. He stressed that before launch of RIMS, RTO should provide training to the technical staff of restaurants so that they may not face any problems in its implementation.

It was agreed Naeem Siddiqui, Chairman, Mian Muhammad Ramzan Member ICCI Tax Sub-Committee and some representatives of Restaurants Association would work with RTO for gradual implementation of RIMS on local restaurants.

Published in Daily Times, December 31^st 2017.