CEBU, Philippines — The Bureau of Internal Revenue in Cebu (BIR-13) is targeting to collect P34.75 billion in taxes this year, as the agency looks to boost taxpayer enforcement after it missed to hit its tax goal in 2018.
BIR-13 assistant regional director VC Cadangen said yesterday the bureau will further step up its enforcement efforts to ensure tax evaders are penalized.
"We are also focusing on strict monitoring our medium taxpayers," the official told The FREEMAN in a phone interview yesterday.
Of the total goal for 2019, BIR-13 is tasked to collect P19.44 billion in income taxes, P11.33 billion in value-added taxes and P20.45 million in excise taxes.
If the corporate tax reform will be passed this year, the agency has targeted to rake in an additional P702.60 million in taxes if such measure gets implemented.
The government’s corporate tax reform aims to cut corporate taxes and rationalize fiscal incentives.
"We are awaiting the Congress for the TRAIN (Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion) 1B to get passed," Cadangen noted.
BIR-13, the agency collecting taxes in Cebu and Bohol, missed to meet its collection goal in 2018, the year when the government implemented the first package of its comprehensive tax reform program.
BIR-13 collected a total of P27.89 billion in taxes, 12.95% short of the agency's P32.04-billion collection goal for the year.
The 2018 collection was, however, was up 5% from P26.52 billion collected in 2017.
The first package of the TRAIN Law -- which cuts personal income taxes but imposes new excise taxes on cigarettes, sugary drinks, oil products and vehicles, among other goods -- affected the agency's collection performance last year.
The TRAIN Law had raised the tax-exempt cap on personal income tax to an annual salary of P250,000, significantly affecting BIR's tax collections.
The TRAIN law, signed by President Duterte in December 2017, took effect since Jan. 1 last year, imposing new excise taxes on certain goods, to compensate for the restructured personal income tax regime that raised the tax-exempt cap to an annual salary of P250,000.
The excise taxes on the said goods were new levies, giving the government fresh sources of revenue.
The government was expecting that the new taxes on consumption would compensate for the lower personal income tax rates under the TRAIN Law, which pulled down income tax collections last year.