The Internet can provide electronic, paperless filing and payments that is fast and easy, secure and free. Online guides and frequently asked questions are available for users.
The system is accessible 24x7 and incentives can be given easily to encourage usage. In the case of the Philippines, these incentives include filing deadlines that are one to five days later than manual filing and payment deadlines are up to 5 days later. These types of behavioral incentives are effective.
Due to the nature of online filing, tax revenue collection can be increased dramatically through the use of data mining.
The Philippines represented by BIR Deputy Commissioner Lilia C. Guillermo presented the winning e-service called Electronic Filing and Payment System (eFPS). It bested the more than 50 delegates from the six economies.
A total of 53 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Digital Opportunity Center (ADOC) e-APEC award nominees from the six ADOC PMEs were invited to Chinese Taipei to share their insights of digital experiences at the ADOC week exhibition and ceremony held in Chinese Taipei from 3 to 6 August 2005.
The Electronic Filing & Payment System (efps) of the BIR won the award for the best epractice in the 2005 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Digital Opportunity Center (ADOC) competition.
This ADOC-sponsored event was participated by six economies, namely Chile, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, and Vietnam.
The BIR’s eFPS was ranked the highest among the 53 entries based on the following criteria: open (public access) 15%, frequency of usage 10%, number of direct/indirect users 25%, social impact- 15%, project duration since deployment 5% and benefits/efficiency improvement 30%.
BIR Deputy Commissioner Guillermo of the Information Systems Group and the eFPS Project Director attended the exhibit and awarding ceremony at the Chinese Taipei last August 2-5, 2005.
The award proves that the BIR is the leading agency in the implementation of electronic commerce in the government, not only in the country but in the whole Asia Pacific region.
Electronic filing and payment system
The eFPS electronic filing and payment system was introduced in 2001. It is an e-service that allowed taxpayers to file and pay their taxes through the BIR website at www.bir.gov.ph.
This e-service allows and gives taxpayers a paperless tax filing experience and convenient payment of tax dues utilizing the power of the Internet. The basic features of eFPS are fast prefills information, automatic calculations and instant filing confirmations.
It has an easy online guides and frequently asked questions, pop-up messages, convenient and available 24 x 7 through the BIR website (www.bir.gov.ph), e-Filing deadlines are 15 days later than manual filing depending on taxpayer’s industry group, e-Payment deadlines are 5 days later than manual payment.
The system is secure with the data transmission is encrypted. It employs multi-level access control such username, password and challenge questions, with free enrollment, usage fee, and no postage or courier expenses.
eFPS was initially made available to volunteering taxpayers and was mandated to the identified large taxpayers in 2002.
The facility was offered to both individual and corporate taxpayers. Said implementation offered 14 BIR Forms developed by an outsourced provider, Fujitsu Phils. Inc. that can be filed and paid online with interface to internet banking facilities of three government banks.
In 2003, the BIR intensified the implementation of the service by outsourcing the same to an Internet Data Center (Ayala Port Inc.).
The system was enhanced to include additional features among others, capability of accepting attachments and downloading of forms that can be worked on offline and submitted later.
The service made available online 27 BIR forms. At present eFPS is being hosted and maintained by a Joint Venture of ePLDT and Sun Microsystems Philippines.
To continuously enforce existing tax laws aimed at reducing the country’s budget deficit, eFPS was mandated to top 10,000 private corporations, insurance companies and stockbrokers in 2004.
In 2005, in an effort to complete the cycle of e-Gov objectives, BIR mandated eFPS to local government units.
From the initial implementation of eFPS in 2002, BIR has established a partnership with two government banks for the e-payment facility. To date, the BIR partner banks have grown to three government banks, nine commercial banks, and one payment gateway.
These banks are LBP, PNB, DBP, RCBC, BPI, BDO, Security Bank UnionBank, Metrobank, Equitable PCI, ChinaBank, Citibank, and BancNet Payment Gateway.
In 2004, BIR registered a remarkable growth in eFPS transactions that is from 57,416 to 212,006 or 269 percent increase compared to previous year. This supports the growing confidence of taxpayers with the electronic means of filing and paying for their taxes.
In terms of collection performance, the year 2004 generated the highest collection effort for eFPS. This amounted to P233.36 billion or 50 percent of the total BIR collection.
While taxpayers were getting accustom to the electronic means of filing and paying for their taxes, the improved practice redounds to greater revenue collections.
eFPS proved to be the most commonly used mode of payment by the transacting public. For January to April 2005 collection period, eFPS collected P96.79 B or 645 of the total BIR collection.
Best in e-Payment award
eFPS earned BIR the coveted Best in e-Payment Award during the 1st Philippine e-Government Awards highlighting the National eCommerce Congress held at the Hotel Intercontinental in Makati in July 2002.
BIR bested other government agencies that accept payments and issue payment acknowledgment using electronic messages or documents.
The BIR plans to continue outsourcing of eFPS hosting maintenance, operations and management to an Internet Data Center (IDC).
The agency would further enhance eFPS features to include additional BIR forms that can be filed online, online acceptance of additional attachments in electronic form, accommodation of all types of taxpayers in filing and paying their taxes, acceptance of all kinds of tax payments interfacing with the use of Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) and ePayment Interface with more participating AABs.
ADOC program
Economic Leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), recognizing the importance of transforming the digital divide into digital opportunities, adopted the "e-APEC Strategy" in 2001.
Chinese Taipei thus proposed the establishment of the APEC Digital Opportunity Center (ADOC) program at the 11th APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting in Bangkok in 2003 which was well received in the Chair’s Summary.
At the 16th APEC Ministerial Meeting on November 2004 in Santiago, Chile, Ministers welcomed ADOC’s progress and restated their commitment to the e-strategy.
During this meeting, the e-APEC Strategy was also further refined to transform the digital divide into a digital opportunity and prepare APEC member economies to use the information revolution as a passport to the new economy.
At the meeting of APEC Ministers Responsible for Trade (MRT) on June 2005 in Jeju, Korea, ministers acknowledged the progress made by the ADOC in bridging the digital divide and enhancing the ability of economies to participate in and contribute to the global economy, thus facilitating trade and investment.
ADOC is an independent, non-profit organization funded by Chinese Taipei.
Its objectives are to achieve the goal of an APEC digital society in accordance with the Leaders’ commitment and the e-APEC s strategy, act as a major enabler of the APEC New Economy by harnessing the full potential of Information and Communication Technologies, and create a cooperative APEC mechanism to help public and private sectors bridge the digital divide.
Autor: Edu H. Lopez
Quelle: The Manila Bulletin, 29.08.2005
