September 23, 2007	Sunday	Ramazan 10, 1428

ISLAMABAD, Sept 22: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has missed the end-June deadline for establishing 20 tax facilitations centres (TFCs) under the World Bank-funded reforms of tax administration.

The board had agreed with the donor agencies of the Tax Administration Reform Project (TARP) to establish at least 25 TFCs — an office to facilitate taxpayers in payment and filing of tax returns.

An official source told Dawn on Saturday that the reform team had so far established only five TFCs — one each at a sideline with the regional tax offices (RTOs).

This will be the second failure of the reform team to comply with the deadlines agreed under the reforms agenda with the World Bank.

According to the official, the FBR has so far established four RTOs — on each at Rawalpindi, Peshawar, Abbotabad, and Quetta. The total number of RTOs is 13, which were supposed to be rolled out by end June 2007.