SGV: BIR policies not helping Phl

By Cheneen R. Capon
ACCOUNTING firm SGV & Co. said the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) must review its policies and regulations in order to make the country attractive to foreign investments.
“In general, what foreign businesses are looking for is consistency in policy, predictability in a way we impose regulations and predictability in the way we apply rules,” SGV head of tax and general counsel Wilfredo U. Villanueva told Edge Davao.
During his presentation at the launching of the Search for the Entrepreneur of the Year at SGV office at the Damosa IT Park, Villanueva said there were circular orders and memorandums issued by the bureau that lessen the competitiveness of the Philippines.
H said the recent order on electronic filing and registration, for instance, should be reviewed because taxpayers are still experiencing problem on the BIR’s Electronic Filing and Payment System (eFPS) until now.
The eFPS refers to the system developed and maintained by BIR for electronically filing tax returns, including attachments, if any, and paying taxes due thereon, specifically through the internet.”
BIR has set April 15 as the deadline for registration, but Villanueva doubted if many can comply because of the problem in the system.
“Foreign investment need the tax system and tax track simple, predictable and stable,” Villanueva said. “There cannot be a change on the midstream because otherwise we lose our competitiveness.”
Villanueva said many of the country’s Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) neighbors have “already achieved that level of maturity that made them a little bit more attractive than we are.”
“There’s a lot work that needs to be done from my purely tax point,” he said.
Villanueva said the present policies of BIR “are really contrary to the over-all policy of government to attract foreign investment.”
“The DTI (Department of Trade and Industry) for example, and even the Department of Finance (DOF), as a whole, is into making the country more competitive as an investment destination. However, the BIR is going on the opposite way,” he said.
Villanueva added that everyone is hoping that when the next leadership of BIR comes in, there would be a shift in policy and hopefully a review of the things that needed to be reviewed.