February 16, 2007	Friday	Muharram 27, 1428

KARACHI, Feb 15: Sales Tax collectorates will directly issue show cause notices instead of objection memos to the sales tax refund claimants in case of discrepancies in returns under a new CBR directive.

This was stated by Shafqat Mehmud, collector Sales Tax (Enforcement) while talking to the industrialists at the Site Association on Wednesday. He said that the CBR wished to clear the pending refund cases expeditiously and as per new directives his collectorate has started issuing show cause notices to the wrong filers.

He said that the collectorate had decided to set up a computer desk at the reception, which will provide complete information about the status of claims to the applicants without involving the collectorate staff.

The collector advised the Site members that on receipt of a show cause notice they should immediately contact the authorities concerned and get the refund claims cleared.

In case of further dispute the claims would be referred to the audit department for removing discrepancies and ensure early settlement of pending cases. He also agreed to hold a meeting every month at the Site association to discuss pending cases and other issues related to sales tax.

He further said that in zero rated sales tax cases shipment documents were not required any more and now the claimants can submit the declaration form to get the sales tax refund on exports.

The collector asked the chairman Site to provide a list of claims for the period July 2006, which were not received by the department due to the computer problem at their end.

The collector was informed that the pre-STARR refund claims were pending with the department. He asked the association to provide a list of such claims.

Earlier Site Chairman Imran Shaukat in his welcome address raised the issues related to time-barred claims and early disposal of refund cases.