LAHORE, Dec 12: The Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has urged the CBR to implement the new system of e-filing of tax returns from the next tax year, and make it optional by eliminating the mandatory condition of electronic filing for the current year.

The LCCI office-bearers said at a seminar on Monday that only three days were left for submitting tax returns, and it was difficult for most of the firms to comply with the condition. They also called upon the CBR to reduce the e-filing registration fee and bring it to Rs2,000 instead of Rs5,000.

They said the extension in the return-filing date would help the business community understand the new system and the CBR to identify lacunas in it.

The seminar was jointly organized by the LCCI and the Collectorate of Sales Tax and Federal Excise. Regional income tax commissioner Haji Ahmad, sales tax collector Nazim Saleem, LCCI president Mian Shafqat Ali, vice-president Aftab Ahmad Vohra and former president Sheikh Mohammad Asif also spoke on the occasion.

Speaking on the occasion, the LCCI office-bearers said the new system would help save the firms from multiple problems they were earlier facing while filing their returns.

They said the e-filing system would not only eliminate procedural hitches in the way of speedy filing of returns but would also help make the whole procedure transparent as the department would no more be in contact with any company or person. They were of the view that they would continue to cooperate with the CBR in revenue collection in the larger interests of the country.

In his address, regional IT commissioner Haji Ahmad said the e-filing system was a longstanding demand of the chamber and the sales tax collectorate was also striving to bring some new setup to expedite the entire procedure of filing of returns. He said that with the help of this system now the registered firms would be able to file their returns from the offices, which was a giant leap in right direction.

Elaborating the e-filing system, sales tax collector Nazim Saleem said the department had put in a lot of hard work while evolving the new procedure which was free from all sorts of complexities.