KRA woos workers with two-step tax return filing plan

KRA commissioner -general John Njiraini. FILE PHOTO | NMG 

ment

By CONSTANT MUNDA
More by this Author

Summary

• The law requires all persons with KRA PIN to file annual returns between January and June
• In the year ended June last year, the taxman collected nearly Sh180.37 billion from PAYE, which is deducted from employee’s monthly salary, 14.03 percent growth over Sh158.17 billion a year earlier.

Employees filing tax returns this year only have to fill in data on pension and annual relief as the taxman moves to ease the process and boost compliance ahead of the June 30 deadline.

The Kenya Revenue Authority said it has configured iTax, the online tax filing system, to automatically capture the data of employers who submit Pay As You Earn (PAYE) tax.

This effectively leaves employees with the task of reviewing and confirming various data sets which they previously had to key into the system.

Related Content

• Wife of KRA employee loses Sh19.6m in anti-graft purge
• Firms cite VAT formula for rise in loan defaults
• KRA shakes up top staff, sets ambitious tax collection target
• KRA on path to net 66,000 landlords

“KRA has enhanced iTax to have an auto-populated return of employment income. This has made it much easier, smoother and faster for employees whose source of income is only employment to file their returns,” the underperforming agency said in a statement on Friday.

Taxpayers who will miss the June 30 deadline for filing returns face a penalty of Sh2,000 for individuals and Sh10,000 or five percent of the tax due for other entities under the Tax Procedure Act, 2015.

Nil returns

The law requires all persons with KRA PIN to file annual returns between January and June, with those with no source of income such as students required to file NIL returns.

KRA commissioner-general John Njiraini has said the enhancement of the iTax to upload PAYE data submitted by employers was the first phase of the ongoing configuration of the system to upload data from third-party systems.

Also Read

EconomyKenya in spat with Iran over Sh4bn tea exports

EconomyWind, solar cut Sh6bn of Kenya Power diesel uptake

“We have a full series of enhancements that we are doing to iTax that are already ongoing,” Mr Njiraini said on January 16.

“Those of you who are employees, when your employer do PAYE declarations, that information comes with your PIN and iTax is able to pick it and place it in your account.”

In the year ended June last year, the taxman collected nearly Sh180.37 billion from PAYE, which is deducted from employee’s monthly salary, 14.03 percent growth over Sh158.17 billion a year earlier.