September 3, 2002	Tuesday	Jamadi-us-Saani24,1423

KARACHI, Sept 2: The central chairman, Pakistan Business Forum, Mian Tanweer Ahmed Mangoon, has drawn the CBR attention towards certain ambiguities in the newly announced Sales Tax Refund Rules 2002.

In a statement issued on Monday, he said it was not clear from the new rules that the existing Gold or Silver status holders would apply again for such category or not.

Whether refund claims filed on August 31, 2002, the date when the new rules were made public, will be considered under the new rules or under the repealed SRO 417 of 2000.

Mangoon further sought clarification from the CBR, in case the computer system of the department goes out of order then any manual alternative arrangement exists for receiving of refund claims.

The most important may be, he said that certain similar facilities to Gold or Silver exporters were also available under the repealed SRO 417 of 2000, but unfortunately refunds have not been made to them accordingly. Therefore in this regard how an exporter can be assured by the CBR that new rules will be complied with in true spirit of the law.