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Economic Confidential,
June 25, 2009
TAX MATTERS
FIRS Generates Taxpayers Numbers for Bank Customers
The Federal Inland Revenue Service is on the verge of completion of
generating Taxpayer Identification Numbers, TIN for all corporate
bank account customers. This is contained in the Monthly Report of
the FIRS for the month of May 2009, released recently.
Banks are expected to furnish FIRS with the list of their individual
bank account owners who are residents of the Federal Capital
Territory , FCT, in addition to the list of their corporate
customers. FIRS collects Personal income tax for residents of the
FCT and members of the armed forces and the police.
In the same vein, banks may be disabled from the FIRS Pay Direct
portal if they fail to supply FIRS with a list of their corporate
customers to enable the Service generate TIN for the remainder of
all their customers.
Tax Identification Number, TIN is unique number, generated
electronically as part of the registration process and assigned to a
taxpayer: company, enterprise or individual for identification. The
unique number eases tracking of taxpayers and access to their tax
history and records.
Banks are expected to submit the list of their corporate customers
to enable the agency generate TIN for all such taxpayers.
The TIN number is a prerequisite for banks for upload of tax
payments on the Interswitch platform, for sweeping (clearance of
such payments) into Lead banks and into the Central Bank of Nigeria,
CBN.
TIN is a prerequisite for transacting business with government
agencies. Banks are to request for TIN when opening new accounts for
current account holders or when customers are transacting business
on such accounts.
TIN shall be required from each taxpayer when payments for the
following taxes are being made to Collecting Banks: Petroleum Profit
Tax, PPT, Companies Income Tax, CIT, Capital Gains Tax, Education
Tax, Value Added Tax, VAT, Withholding on corporate bodies, Stamp
Duties for companies, National Information Technology Development
Fund Levy and Personal Income Tax.
FIRS Executive Chairman, Mrs. Ifueko Omoigui Okauru, explained in a
recent presentation that without a clear knowledge of the taxpayers
and their profiles, it will be difficult to have any articulate plan
or strategy for effective tax administration. “This would be further
enhanced with the institutionalisation of the unique taxpayer
identification system as is practiced in other developed tax
jurisdictions. The FIRS Act empowers the FIRS to collaborate with
States and Local Governments to make this happen”.
“With TIN, every taxpayer would be assigned a unique identification
number which should be inserted in every documented transaction
(sales, purchases, payment of bills etc). This will enable tracking
for tax purposes as is the practice in several tax jurisdictions,
where tax number is used on driving licenses, passports and other
personal documentation.
Along with the new FIRS online payment system, TIN is one of the
fall outs of the processes for the automation of the FIRS tax
collection system.
Another was Project FACT, which eliminated the payment of cash or
cheques by taxpayers and use of cheques at tax offices.
The Integrated Tax Administration System, ITAS is expected to
consolidate all automation processes and projects and ease overall
tax administration by the FIRS.
“Given the fact that some state governments and FIRS are currently
issuing their own TIN, the Joint Tax Board is working to
institutionalise U-TIN as a unique number nationwide, to be part of
every documented transaction. This is the standard practice in other
developed tax jurisdictions”, the FIRS monthly report for May 2009
said |
