BIR expects tax amnesty to boost 2019 collections The revenue goal will increase to P3.
573 trillion next
year, P3.985 trillion in 2021, and hit P4.438 trillion in MANILA, Philippines – The upcoming amnesty 2022. programs on delinquencies and estate taxes will In 2018, total revenues grew 15.2 percent and help the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) achieve its exceeded the target by 0.1 percent “due to higher reduced collection target of P2.27 trillion for 2019, tax collections following the TRAIN Law and non-tax Internal Revenue Commissioner Caesar R. Dulay said revenues,” the Department of Budget and Monday. Management (DBM) said.
“We expect to have a growth rate of a double-digit
figure—more than 10 percent because the increase in goal for this year is about 14.8 percent. So we should try to hit that figure as much as possible. Hopefully, we should go above P2 trillion this 2019,” Dulay told reporters. The BIR collected P1.962 trillion in taxes last year, 4- percent below target.
Its 2019 collection goal was reduced from P2.33
trillion previously as President Duterte vetoed the provision on general amnesty from Republic Act (RA) No. 11213 or the Tax Amnesty Act of 2019, which would have raised P6.82 billion from unpaid internal revenue taxes, except customs and import duties, since 2017 and prior years.
Dulay was nonetheless hopeful that the amnesty on
delinquencies and estate tax amnesty will allow the BIR to collect more this year. The Department of Finance (DOF) had estimated additional revenues from estate tax amnesty to reach P6.28 billion, while the amnesty on delinquencies would generate a bigger P21.26 billion. The Duterte administration’s comprehensive tax reform program is expected to add an average of P214.5 billion in revenues yearly over the medium term and bring the total revenue take above the P4- trillion mark by 2022. Under the fiscal targets approved by Cabinet-level, interagency Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) last March 13, the government wanted to collect P3.15 trillion in tax and non-tax revenues this year, up by a tenth from P2.85 trillion last year. For 2019, the DBCC had said that the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) Act and package 1B sans the e-receipts program scheduled to be piloted next year will generate P162.2 billion.