The Kumasi Office of the Valued Added Tax (VAT) has warned the business community in the metropolis that they risk being arrested and prosecuted if they falsify or destroy basic accounts records on taxes collected from clients on behalf of the VAT.
Mr Francis Ajor of the Suame VAT Office, who gave the warning at a seminar organised to educate restaurants and hotel operators in Kumasi, explained that as agents of the VAT, they needed to keep basic account records for a minimum of six years before disposing of them.
He pointed out that before destroying any business records, the law demanded that the business community should apply and explain the rationale behind their action and should also wait for an endorsement before they could carry out their actions.
Explaining further, he said some businessmen and women deliberately falsified some records of their operations after they had collected VAT from clients, and to avoid detection, they either hid the records or burnt them.
“The taxes you collect from clients on behalf of the state are revenue from the informal sector for national development, and not your capital or profits, so under no circumstance should you fail to render proper accounts to the VAT office,” he noted.
The seminar was the second in a series being organised for restaurants and hotel operators to sensitise them to ensure that their business operations conformed with the provisions enshrined in the VAT Act, 1998 (ACT 546).
About 100 participants attended the seminar, which also sought to educate them on the role of the VAT in sustainable national economic generation to support national development.
In his presentation, Mr Ajor said, basic record keeping in business did not only enhance transparency, but also enabled the business community to detect any anomaly and remedy it, thereby sustaining their operations.
He said such actions also helped the VAT service to collaborate with them in terms of taxes collected on behalf of the state.
“VAT without records undermine operations, and give room for assumptions, which is not the best,” he advised.
He, therefore, charged them to file their returns as regularly as possible and negotiate with the VAT if they had any problem for failing to file their returns at a particular point in time.
He urged them to charge VAT “on all services you offer your clients, including short time, to ensure that you support the state to generate the needed revenue that would enhance accelerated national development”
He expressed concern about the attitude of some traders who refused to offer themselves voluntarily for registration.
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