LAHORE, Oct 1: The Punjab Excise & Taxation Department has so far received ‘poor’ response to its newly launched scheme for lifetime motor vehicle tax for up to 1,000cc capacity cars.

As the scheme largely targeted car owners from middle class, only 45,000 customers deposited lifetime token tax out of 4.1 million registered vehicles in the provincial capital during the last three months, a senior official close to the development told Dawn.

He said pinning hopes on bringing a large number of customers in the tax net, the excise department had trumpeted widely through advertisements in national press of seizing vehicles of defaulters. It had also warned of imposing 100 per cent fine on non-payers.

However, confusion, ambiguities, inadequate arrangements, mismanagement and strict policy in respect of new scheme were said to be the major factors behind the poor response, he said.Surprisingly, the senior management has no province-wide data of total number of target vehicles and the tax collection made so far.

“The E&T department had immediately no district-wise network regarding the statistics of total registered vehicles up to 1,000cc capacity and tax collection since the new scheme was launched on July 1, Punjab Excise and Taxation Director General (DG) Saeed Ahmad Nawaz told Dawn.

He said the E&T department in Lahore had collected Rs18 million on last Sunday.

He said the department had launched this project keeping in view the successful implementation of a similar mega scheme for motorcyclists launched a couple of years ago.

About inadequate arrangements at the E&T offices which caused inconvenience to customers, he said the vehicles registered in Lahore had much resale value compared to those registered in other districts. As the one-third of the total vehicles had been registered in Lahore, the extraordinary rush was a usual phenomenon. “The total tax collection under the ongoing scheme from July 1 to Oct 1 remained Rs250 million in Lahore”, another senior official said.

He said on last date (Sept 30) nearly 3,000 customers deposited lifetime token tax in the provincial capital. About 25 windows were opened to facilitate a large number of customers at the E&T department on Fareed Court Road.

He claimed that no penalty was imposed on the customers after Sept 30 deadline. The motor registering authorities had been issued instructions to waive off penalty for some weeks to attract the customers.

Those motorists who wanted to take `benefit’ of the scheme had been undergoing worst-ever inconvenience owing to confusions and ambiguities in some features of the project.

Talking about the ambiguities, a source said the most ridiculous factor of the E&T scheme was said to be ‘short deadline’ for paying lifetime token tax within three months of its launch.

Instead of facilitating customers to convince them to accept the scheme, the E&T officials evolved strict policies.

The source said the E&T had announced 100 per cent penalty on defaulters after deadline. In the amended rules, there was no provision of imposing penalty on the defaulters. Even words ‘penalty for lifetime token tax defaulters’ were missing from amended rules, he said.

The E&T senior management has ‘filled’ this gap by implementing the old motor vehicle rules of 1965. It had also awarded discretionary powers to motor registering authorities for penalising the defaulters. The ‘panicked’ customers were unaware of these internal arrangements.

The Punjab government had introduced the new law through Finance Bill 2012. Later, the government made amendment to the motor vehicle tax for the vehicles up to 1000cc capacity. Under the amended law, one-time motor vehicle tax was fixed at Rs10,000.

The motorists were bearing additional ‘financial burden’ under the heads of professional and income taxes as the said feature of the new scheme was not publicised in the department campaign, the source claimed.

Even after paying lifetime token tax, they would have to pay annually the income and professional taxes.

The car users will pay Rs750 income tax and Rs200 professional tax which will be deposited with the national exchequer.

The E&T officials were also collecting taxes from the owners of old vehicles against the ‘lost’ original receipts of their taxes they had paid under the old system.

When the visiting motorists asked the officials to verify paid amount against missing receipts from the department’s record, the officials refused to accommodate them saying that they had no system to re-check the status of total taxes paid against old registered vehicles.

About inadequate arrangements to cater to a large number of customers, the source said the hardware and software system was not upgraded for processing the data of millions of customers under the new scheme.

“On finding serious technical issues in the software system, the E&T has demanded Rs40 million in a summary forwarded to the Punjab government a month ago,” Saeed Ahmad Nawaz said when asked about the status of the system.

He said motorists’ response to the new scheme remained satisfactory.