KRA adds taxpayers 30 days to file returns

KRA COMMISSIONER-GENERAL JOHN NJIRAINI. FILE PHOTO | NMG 

By BRIAN NGUGI

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Summary

• The Kenya Revenue Authority had warned that it would deactivate the personal identification numbers (PINs) of non-compliant taxpayers from Thursday last week.
• The move could have seen millions of Kenyans blocked from accessing critical public services.
• KRA has now given taxpayers a 30-day grace period to regularise their tax status or face penalties.

The Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) has given taxpayers a 30-day grace period to regularise their tax status or face penalties.

The KRA had warned that it would deactivate the personal identification numbers (PINs) of non-compliant taxpayers from Thursday last week in what could have seen millions of Kenyans blocked from accessing critical public services.

The taxman had also earlier in May said individuals who would fail to file annual returns for 2016 by the June 30 deadline faced a fine of five per cent of the tax due or a maximum of Sh20,000.

On Friday, the taxman who has been under huge pressure from the Treasury to collect more tax notified individuals who had not filed their returns to do so by end of this month.

“This is to inform you that, your return for obligation Income Tax - Resident Individual and period from: 01/01/2016 to 31/12/2016 is not received by Kenya Revenue Authority by the due date 30/06/2017,” said KRA in one such notice seen by the Business Daily.

READ: Millions to miss services as KRA deactivates PINs

“Kindly submit your return within next 30 days ending on 01/10/2017. Failure to submit return will attract penalty/interest.”

The KRA did not respond to our requests for comment on the amnesty and the specific penalties to be imposed on the defaulters.

A KRA communication official said the taxman would issue a communication on the matter this week.

The notice to defaulters which appeared to mark change of tack by the taxman came barely a week after the KRA declared it would push ahead with its controversial plan to delist tax defaulters.

READ: Taxman pushes ahead with PIN blocking plans

ALSO READ: Lawyers fault KRA plan of deactivating PINs

The KRA had on Tuesday last week maintained in a public notice that it would deregister all taxpayers who had either not filed or had not migrated their profiles to the online platform beginning September 1 as part of a wider plan to smoke out tax cheats.

“KRA has noted that there are taxpayers who have not migrated their PINs into iTax while others, who are already on iTax, are either not filing or are filing nil or no returns,” the agency said last Tuesday in a public notice.

“KRA, therefore, notifies the general public that those who have not updated their PINs in iTax should do so by 31 August 2017 and commence filing immediately.”

Legal experts had, however, faulted the taxman’s plans to deactivate non-compliant taxpayers’ PINs, terming it illegal.

Lawyers had in the wake of the ruling argued that holding a tax PIN is the right of every citizen that cannot be taken away without following due process.

“KRA does not issue PINs to citizens as a favour but as provided for in law, in the same way the Department of Registration of Persons issues Identity Cards or Passports,” Nairobi lawyer Nashon Aluoka said.

“It is an instrument that every adult needs to transact the business of life and meet their obligations as citizens and can only be taken away as provided for in law or through a court order,” he argued.