ISLAMABAD: Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has discontinued manual issuance of income tax refunds with immediate effect to ensure transparency.
The release of income tax refunds will be carried out electronically, said an office order of the FBR dated May 29, 2020.
The FBR is going to disburse income tax refunds directly to bank accounts of claimants. In this regard, the finance ministry released an amount of Rs10 billion for payment of income tax refunds, official sources said on Saturday.
The finance ministry initially provided the fund of Rs10 billion to the FBR for sanctioning of income tax refunds to taxpayers.
The FBR decided to liquidate amount of Rs5 million claims out of the fund. Pending income tax refunds already prepared and kept in draft mode in Iris by the relevant officers where the amount of Rs5 million (cumulatively) has to be liquidated at this stage.
The FBR further explained that cumulatively means the total amount of refund in respect of a taxpayer (for the tax year 2014 to 2019) duly processed and sanctioned under the law.
The FBR further directed the chief commissioners that bank-wise (with IBAN numbers) taxpayers-wise lists of cases ripe for the sanctioning of income tax refunds up to Rs5 million should be dispatched by May 31, 2020.
The FBR said that since the entire process of refund issuance under Prime Minister’s COVID-19 Package had to be carried out electronically, by disbursal of refunds through the AGPR, therefore, no manual issuance of income tax refunds is allowed till further orders.
