KARACHI, July 28: The government is conscious of the need for timely refunds of sales tax and is making all efforts to resolve the problems in this regard.

This was stated by minister of state and chairman of the Export Promotion Bureau, Tariq Ikram, while presiding over the first meeting of the sales tax committee here on Saturday.

The committee was constituted by the EPB chief as announced by the finance minister in his budget speech. It is charged to review and revise the existing sales tax refund rules under SRO- 417.

The object is to speed up the refunds of the sales tax on zero-rated exports that have been subject to delays in the past affecting the financial liquidity of the exporters.

The committee will address various problems with a view to devise a regime in which, as far as possible, taxes were not paid nor refunds claimed as under the DTRE scheme.

The meeting was attended by Ejaz Ahmed Qureshi, vice- chairman, EPB, and senior officers of the sales tax department headed by Ramzan Bhatti, member (sales tax) in the CBR.

The representatives from the trade included Wajid Jawwad, G.R. Arshad, Mian Muhammad Latif, Chaudhry Abdul Haq, Fawwad Ijaz and Farrukh Sheikh.

The committee members discussed the new refund rules proposed by the CBR. The trade representatives generally opposed the proposal to limit the refund on stocks up to the export production requirement of three months.

Member sales tax informed the meeting that the department had paid out sales tax refunds to the tune of Rs35 billion in the year just ended compared to Rs29 billion in the preceding year.

He said the refund facility had been misused in the past and the CBR had been paying out more refunds than the actual sales tax collections.

It was necessary to control the fake and flying invoices and the exporters were also expected to keep in view the revenue interest of the government, he added.—APP