Africa-Press – Tanzania. TANZANIA Revenue Authority (TRA) has collected 18.14tril/- for the 2020/2021 financial year, up compared to 17.2tril/- garnered in the past year.
The taxman said it collected the amount from July 1, 2020, to June 30, 2021, which is an average of 1.51tril/- per month.
“In a special way, TRA congratulate and express gratitude to taxpayers and the public for their contribution to the collections despite various challenges, including coronavirus pandemic that has affected the business environment and the lives of the public,” said TRA Commissioner General, Alphayo Kidata in a statement to the media.
Mr Kidata urged the public to continue being patriotic and pay taxes voluntarily for the taxman to meet 2021/2022 target that is set at the tune of 22tril/-.
According to him, in the fourth quarter of the 2020/2021 fiscal year from April to June 2021, TRA collected 4.45tril/-, where in April it collected 1.34tril/-, 1.35tril/- in May and 1.85tril/- in June.
He attributed the collection rise to various measures being taken, including addressing challenges facing business people in paying tax and strengthening electronic tax systems.
“We revisited electronic systems for improvement to enable traders and the public to pay taxes due to challenges that had risen in the past to make sure that taxpayers raised their issues with TRA to seek solutions,” he noted.
The Commissioner assured taxpayers and the public that they are fully committed to improving tax management in the country, including improving service delivery, expanding tax education, enabling a variety of electronic services and improving relationships with taxpayers.
The taxman is of the belief that these measures will lead to promotion of voluntary tax payment, and thus increase government revenue collections, will will enable it to give better services to the public and carry out development projects.
Outlining strategies to expand the tax base in the nation, he said from August 2021, TRA will conduct an exercise to register new businesses across the country, starting with the Dar es Salaam Region to increase their participation in contributing to government revenue.
“We call on businesses and the public to take part in this special exercise aimed at ensuring that every business person contributes to the development of our country, instead of relying on a small group of taxpayers. This exercise will go hand in hand with ensuring on proper use of Electronic Fiscal Devices (EFD) machines for traders,” he said.
Mr Kidata reminded traders to consider their obligation to file tax returns and pay their taxes on time to avoid unnecessary interest and penalties. In addition, TRA offices nationwide are open to serve people, including resolving any challenges they face and receiving suggestions to improve performance.
During the 2017/2018 fiscal year, a target of collecting 17.1tril/- was met by 89 per cent when 15.1tril/- collected. To curb fake EFD receipts, the taxman has developed a software to focus on the challenge, whereby all receipts now have verification and Quick Response (QR) codes.
“There are traders who were subjected to unrealistic tax estimates, thus TRA made arrangements to involve them, listen to them and agree on the amount they could pay instead,” he said.
Regarding VAT Returns, the Commissioner said so far TRA has had claims from traders amounting to 844bn/ -, but in the 100 days of President Samia, they have been able to pay 92bn/-
