APTMA gets Rs10 billion refunds from FBR, seeks more relief

LAHORE: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has paid Rs10 billion in refunds to the textile sector since July 2023, including deferred payments, a senior tax official said on Tuesday.

Syed Mahmood Hussain Jafri, chief commissioner of the Large Tax Office (LTO) Lahore, told the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA) that deferred claims, adjustment of pending refunds and liabilities and exemption certificates would be resolved shortly.

“FBR has paid Rs10 billion refunds since July 2023, including the deferred ones," Jafri said. However, he sought a list of APTMA member not able to receive refunds so far to expedite processing.

The Chief Commissioner assured the APTMA members of solving the textile industry issues during his visit to the association’s north office. He was accompanied by LTO Lahore Commissioner Dr Ali Adnan Zaidi.

APTMA North Chairman Kamran Arshad and Secretary General Raza Baqir welcomed him on the occasion. The chief commissioner said the FBR has established the LTOs to address the issues of large taxpayers, while acknowledging their role in revenue generation. He appreciated APTMA’s role in export and employment enhancement.

Replying to the suggestion that the LTO should allow tax adjustment, he said the FBR was already processing inter-tax adjustments to facilitate the taxpayers. According to him, the problem being faced by the APTMA members due to staff shortage would be addressed soon. He also sought proposals to improve the sales tax refund system.

Earlier, Kamran Arshad said pending tax refunds of a large number of taxpayers with the LTO were causing a financial crunch for the already crisis-driven textile industry. He further pointed out that a huge amount of sales tax claims deferred by the FASTER system required normal processing by the tax authorities. These deferred claims are needed to be processed immediately as funds worth millions of rupees of every member mill remain stuck with the revenue body, he added.

Arshad urged the visiting Chief Commissioner to set up a dedicated cell for processing of all deferred cases with the direction of no pendency for more than one month.

In case of staff shortage, he proposed that at least 80 percent of the claimed amount may be sanctioned provisionally to the corporate sector against an undertaking.

He also mentioned that the APTMA member mills faced delay in issuance of exemption certificates and urged to expedite the process for the corporate units.

APTMA members including Anjum Zafar, Naveed Gulzar and others highlighted that all the buyers and suppliers of the suspected units were included in the so-called investigations on detection of any case of tax fraud, which was tantamount to “harassment of the genuine taxpayers”.

The members said that the FBR should not summon every registered business with a transaction history connected to suspected units on mere suspicion, especially where buying or selling was carried out after confirmation from the active taxpayer list.

Arshad proposed to involve APTMA in all such inquiries for a meaningful inquiry. APTMA Secretary General Raza Baqir presented a vote of thanks to the visiting Chief Commissioner LTO and expressed the hope that mutual interaction will continue in future as well.