FBR sets Aug 31 deadline for salaried tax return

KARACHI: Federal Board of Revenue on Thursday asked salaried tax payers to file their income tax returns this year by August 31, a deadline which has only three working days and set to expire in next five days.

The revenue body issued income returns forms for the tax year 2016 for individuals and Association of Persons (AOPs). Tax officials said the form was issued before the cut-off date.  The FBR, on August 11, issued draft return form and also invited stakeholders comment. It said “the draft will be taken into consideration by the FBR after fifteen days of its publication.”

According to the FBR’s issued SRO 792(I)/2015 the deadline for the filing of income tax return for salaried persons is August 31. While for the AOPs and companies, falling in special account year is September 30 and for corporate entities the last date is December 31.

Tax experts feared many people would fail to file their income tax return on the short deadline set by the revenue authorities, “Especially the salaried persons would not be able to file their tax liabilities due to certain requirements in the returns,” said a tax expert.

“A salary person is required to have withholding statement of salary deduction from his employer to determine and insert taxable amount.” He said certain withholding statements, which are adjustable against the final tax liabilities, including deduction at mobile phone bills, purchase of car, banking transactions etc are time consuming. “Further, every salaried person, having income above Rs400,000 is required to file an annual return electronically, along with a wealth statement.”

Salaried persons were around 30-40 percent of total return filers in the country. In actual, the FBR is giving them only three days in case they hired third party help as Saturday and Sunday were closed, another expert said.

As per FBR, a person filing the return for the first time should reconcile a wealth statement for the previous year. Tax experts said the FBR should allow at least two months from issuance of return form for filing return.

Muhammad Zubair, former president, Karachi Tax Bar Association (KTBA), said it was impossible for a salaried person to file his return by the given deadline, and the FBR should consider extending the date.

He further said that the persons under Final Tax Regime (FTR) were also required to file their return by August 31. “There are calculation problems for FTR cases on the FBR portal,” Zubair said.