e-filing tax return launch soon

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) is expected to launch the online tax return filing system by this month to make taxpayers’ annual income statement submissions easier.

The tax administrator had set a target to introduce the online tax return by September.

Ahead of November 30—the deadline for the individual tax return submission, the NBR has been working hard to launch the e-filing tax return system.

The NBR had missed the targets to roll out the e-filing tax return system several times.

The NBR has been working on a number of projects to digitise the income tax, value-added tax, and customs wings since 2011, and the e-filing under the income tax wing and bond management automation project under the customs wing was scheduled to launch first in July and then in August this year.

“Our work is almost over. The project delays as we’re testing the whole system first before the launch,” NBR Member (Tax Policy) Md Alamgir Hossain told The Business Post. He said the project is on trial now. “We’re trying to find out the problems if any. Before launching the system, we’re trying to make it operationally sound,” he said.

The NBR member expected that the taxpayers would be able to file their tax returns online this year.

“Hopefully, the e-filling system will formally be launched this month. AChallan, e-Payment will be integrated into the system,” he added.

Taxpayers will be able to file their income tax returns online even using their mobile handsets, according to the NBR officials.

The launch was delayed due to some faults found within the systems, said an official.

Under the system, taxpayers can easily manage their information and will be able to submit their returns within minutes anytime from anywhere in the world by logging on to the e-filing system, he said.

The automation system will also help tax officials monitor taxpayer data to maintain transparency, he added.

When the system will be fully operational, all the accounts of the taxpayers, including income and expenditure, movable and immovable assets, number of vehicles, amount of money deposited in the bank and transactions, amount of ornaments will be inserted in the NBR database, said the NBR official.

This will allow NBR officials to easily verify the authenticity of taxpayers’ information online, said another official.

It will also be easier to detect the increase and decrease of wealth and income of any taxpayer, he added.

Earlier in November 2016, the revenue board launched the e-filing system developed by Vietnamese company FPT under the Bangladesh Integrated Tax Administration System (BiTax).

But only 21,104 taxpayers filed their tax returns online during the five fiscal years between FY2016 and FY2020. Of those, a total of 7,209 income taxpayers, 0.33 per cent of the total 22 lakh returns, filed their tax returns online in FY2020.

Officials said that they developed the home-grown system as BiTax-developed with the financial support of the Asian Development Bank did not work.

They said that a 13-member team consisting of income tax and ICT officials of the NBR developed the system, addressing the shortcomings taxpayers faced in using the previous system.

Individual taxpayers will be able to obtain their tax certificate, acknowledgment receipts and taxpayers’ identification number anytime from their account in the system.

Taxpayers will have to register them with the website using their mobile phone number registered with the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission.