BIR misses Q1 target

CEBU, Philippines - The Central Visayas revenue regional office No. 13 of the Bureau of Internal Revenue, missed its collection target for the first quarter of 2012, generating only P3.067 billion of the ambitioned P3.2 billion.

BIR Regional Director Rodita Galanto said they suffered a major blow with zero collection from the government contracts and fell short in the collection of documentary stamps and transfer of some real estate taxes.

In specifying factors that led to the deficit, Galanto cited the government contract like roads and bridges of the Department of Public Works and Highways, in which the winning bidder has to pay taxes. She suspects that bidding for the projects in the Central Visayas was conducted in Manila.

Galanto also said the collection of real estate transfer tax as P15 million this quarter compared to P23 million last year.  

Regarding documentary stamps, the BIR only collected P106 million compared to last year with P119 million.

Nevertheless, Galanto said they were able to collect P29 million in taxes from the hotels for this year compared to last year with only P22 million and P34 million for this quarter on restaurants compared to last year with only P29 million.

Galanto believes that they will meet their target collection for the year and hopefully even exceed this year’s target collection of P14.677 billion. –(FREEMAN)