KARACHI: M/s Telenor Pakistan has paid Rs50 million to customs authorities that were short paid due to wrong classification of HS Code while clearance of telecommunication equipment imported by the cellular operator.
An official at Directorate of Customs Intelligence and Investigation, Karachi on Tuesday confirmed that the phone service provider paid the amount of Rs25 million each during August and September.
The official said that the import for September had been checked for correct classification and detected an avoidance of Rs25 million and the directorate further undertook scrutiny for the month of August, which also resulted in recovery of another Rs25 million.
Recently, in a case the directorate blocked 09 consignments of M/s Telenor were online blocked by Customs. After the examination it was found that that telecommunication equipments i.e. GU Base Stations, IPASO Link Radio equipment, Areal equipments pol/directional antennas-mounting brackets, GSM equipments, Yuasa power equipment-with installation material, outdoor rectifier / battery cabinets etc, which were got cleared under one & same HS Code i.e. 8517-6990 attracting 10 percent duty. However, these attracted higher duty rate.
The total differential amount of duty and taxes has been worked out to Rs33.03 million, which is recoverable from M/s Telenor.
Telenor Pakistan Pvt., (Ltd), Islamabad has requested for release of their consignments on the plea that as the same pertain to 3G technology and to be rolled out, hence projects are badly affected, due to non availability of these equipments. In view of the above, Telenor has requested that said 09 consignments may be opened and re-assessed in the -light of additional recoverable duty/taxes as calculated by the Customs, so that M/s.Telenor Pakistan could pay the same for subsequent deblocking of the consignments.
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