KARACHI: Chairman Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) is scheduled to visit Custom House Karachi on Monday ahead of the visit of Federal Minister for Finance, Ishaq Dar.
Ishaq Dar would be visiting the Customs House on Tuesday. Officials said that since the revenue of Customs Collectorate (South) had drastically declined by around 40 percent in the last two months, it ringed the bells at various quarters.
FBR Chairman would hold meetings with the senior officers of Customs to finalize the monthly numbers and prepare a report for the Minister.
According to details, there are multiple reasons for the declining revenue collection; most of the imports have been diverted to dry ports as now with honest and efficient officers at Karachi Customs House, it has become quite difficult for the importers to avoid duty/taxes through mis-classification, mis-declaration or misuse of SROs.
It was also known that import was also diverted to Bandar Abbas, where a ring was operating delivering goods at the importers’ doorsteps for just rs80 per KG.
It was also known that there were many flaws in the WeBOC and the data had been corrupted. Officials said that some importers were paying duties/taxes at the rate of $2.0/KG while other importers had to pay $8.0/KG for the same goods which compelled the importers to opt for smugglers.
However, there is in exercise underway to eliminate the concessionary SROs and make them part of the tariff, the revenue collection would stabilize in a couple of months.