Lower revenues in July a temporary setback – DOF

MANILA, Philippines – While reforms initiated by the Duterte administration have resulted to lower revenues in July, the Bureau of Internal Revenue says this is just a temporary setback as it is slowly regaining the public’s trust.

“Remember that there was a change in government and therefore transition,” BIR assistant commissioner Marissa Cabreros told The STAR in a phone interview yesterday.

“This was also a result of the new government looking inward, charging erring BIR officials since we want to regain public trust, as well as the suspension of audits,” she said.

BIR, which accounts for around 80 percent of state revenues, collected P117.4 billion during President Duterte’s first month in office, down one percent from the previous year.

The contraction marked the first time this year BIR recorded lower revenues.  The drop also followed the 7.3-percent decline last December. According to data from the Bureau of the Treasury.

But Cabreros is optimistic BIR will regain ground in the coming months as it cleans up its ranks by suing and removing erring employees.

From July to August, BIR suspended six personnel and placed nearly 90 of its employees from Manila and Makati City under investigation for various reasons, which include failure to report collections.

“I am sure that in the coming months, collections will grow as we also move to regain public trust in the bureau,” Cabreros said.

“Raising revenues is not only a function of the BIR but we’re also calling for voluntary compliance, so it also depends on people paying the right dues,” she said.

In addition, Cabreros, who was appointed BIR spokesperson, attributed the drop in the agency’s collections to the suspension of tax audits from July 1 until the end of July.  Audits have since been resumed.

“Of course when people know that there won’t be any investigations, they might say, ‘why do I need to pay (taxes) no one is going to investigate me anyway,’” she said.