COA flags BIR for failure to remit taxes, contributions

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Audit (COA) has called out the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) over its failure to timely remit P80.914 million in withholding taxes and social contributions of its employees for 2017.

The COA said P10.29 million of the amount in the BIR’s withholding taxes and contributions remains unsettled as of this year.

Based on COA’s annual audit report posted on its website Friday, the BIR at the start of 2017 had a balance of P54.021 million in unremitted withholding taxes and social contributions of its employees, carried over from the previous year.

The COA said that apart from this beginning balance, the BIR had also deducted from the salaries of its officials and employees a total of P1.285 billion in withholding taxes and social contributions for the entire 2017, thus a total of P1.339 billion should have been remitted to the concerned agencies.

The COA said that as of Dec. 31, 2017, the BIR was only able to remit P1.285 billion, hence there remains a balance of P80.914 million.

A breakdown provided by COA showed that P52.923 million of the year-end balance was due to BIR itself in withholding taxes. 

The audit body said P44.923 million of the amount was remitted only in January 2018, while P4.022 million was refunded to the BIR employees, leaving a balance of P6.955 million “to be reconciled by the Accounting Division/Finance Division of the National Office (NO) and Revenue Regional Offices (RROs) concerned.”

Meanwhile, of the P23.324 million balance due to the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), only P20.629 million was remitted in unspecified month or months of 2018, with the remaining P2.695 million “due for reconciliation of NO and RROs 3, 5, 7, 13 and 17.”

Of the P1.897-million yearend balance due to Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth), P1.446 million was remitted in January 2018, leaving a balance of P450,602.46 due for reconciliation.

Of the P2.771-million balance due to Home Development Mutual Fund or Pag-IBIG, P2.581 million was remitted only in January 2018, leaving a balance of P190,000 up for reconciliation.

In a comment incorporated in the report, the BIR explained the balance “which appears to be unremitted” actually pertains to the amounts to be refunded to its employees as well as to the accounts up for adjustment by the Accounting and Finance divisions.

The BIR said the total yearend balance also includes carry over balances caused by the implementation of the Electronic New Government Accounting System (e-NGAS) in 2016.

“We recommended and (BIR) management agreed to require the accounting division to conduct an in-depth reconciliation/analysis of the inter-agency payable accounts; remit the balances, if any; and revert those without valid claimants,” the COA said.

The COA also recommended to the BIR to require its Human Resource Division and Accounting Division to conduct a regular reconciliation of employees’ payroll “so that what is deducted from the employees’ salaries should be the same amount to be remitted on or before their due dates.”