Businesses to face prosecution

The Internal Revenue Commission (IRC) will take legal action against businesses that fail to comply with the National Government's Goods and Services Tax Relief on taxing basic households' items.

The initiative has been rolled out in the last 12 months.

Passed in the 2024 national budget, the relief spent over the last 12 months with the aim to cushion high costs of goods and services as a result of the Ukraine-Russia war, inflation and others.

Despite warnings, many business houses have been non-compliant.

In an interview earlier this week, the IRC Acting Commissioner General, Sam Loi said, many businesses have been very stubborn.

"There is a lot of shops that are not doing the right thing.

“IRC is present in about 23 locations, so our teams are now passing that information to the local offices who carry on the follow-ups on them.” He said.

Mr. Loi said to get the message out to business houses, couple of them have been issued penalties and a few are listed for prosecution.

Treasurer Ian Ling- Stuckey announced that the full-year cost of this relief is estimated at K500 million, which includes K420 million in foregone internal GST revenue collections and K80 million in port GST.

This household assistance was also timely, given the impacts of the US, Israel and Iran war this year.

Though it may not make much of a difference, the IRC reiterates that the government is also offering relief in other areas like education, health and salary and wages, which people must appreciate.