Shaikh meets leading businessmen to review returns on sales tax refunds

ISLAMABAD: Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance & Revenue Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh on Wednesday met a group of leading businessmen representing various export sectors contributing nearly US $ 2 billion exports, to discuss and review progress on the issues pertaining to payment of Sales Tax refunds to exporters.

Adviser to Adviser Commerce Mr. Ali Habib, Chairman FBR Syed Shabbar Zaidi and Secretary Finance Naveed Kamran Baloch were also present in the meeting which was attended by leading exporters from Lahore and Karachi, including Mr. Shahid Soorty, Mr. Musaadiq Zulqarnain, Mr. Fawad Anwer, Mr. Shahid Abdullah, Mr. Bashir Ali Mohammad, Mr. Rizwan Dewan, Mr. Asif Tata, Mr. Ahmed Ibrahim, Mr. Sameer Chinoy and Mr. Khurram Mukhtar. During the proposals, various proposals were put forward from the businessmen and exporters and FBR was advised to work more aggressively on reforming and simplifying the processes through automation for early and prompt payment of sales tax refunds.

He told the businessmen he had already constituted a committee comprising officials from FBR and members of APTMA to simplify the Form-H within the next few days to make it simpler and easy for the exporters claiming sales tax refunds.

The businessmen were asked to nominate anyone they liked to become part of the Committee as he wanted to ensure a hassle-free submission of tax refund claims and their subsequent payment without any delay.

The businessmen thanked the Adviser and his team in FBR for ensuring payment of Rs 32 billion sales tax refunds to the exporters in the last couple of days.

The Adviser told the businessmen that FBR was working very hard to facilitate the exporters and another Rs 2 to 3 billion tax refunds would also be issued within the next couple of days.