The Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) has urged the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to take decisive steps against individuals involved in manipulating sales tax returns of registered taxpayers. This manipulation involves fabricating sales/purchases data to illegitimately benefit from billions of rupees.

The FTO has specifically directed the FBR to promptly address and rectify this issue by taking immediate action against those engaged in such fraudulent activities.

A complaint has been formally lodged against the Member IR (Operations) FBR and Director Intelligence and Investigation (IR), Karachi, under the provisions of the Federal Tax Ombudsman Ordinance, 2000 (FTO Ordinance).

The complaint alleges their failure to resolve the matter concerning the deletion of counterfeit purchases and sales recorded in the annexures of the sales tax return submitted by a registered person (RP) for the month of September 2023. This manipulation has been attributed to unscrupulous individuals.

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In summary, the complainant, involved in the paper and paperboard products business and taxed by RTO-1 in Karachi, discovered an unauthorized change in their login password. Attempts to recover it were thwarted as the hackers had also altered their mobile number and email.

Promptly, the complainant reached out to the tax office in Karachi the following day, and a helpful FBR official facilitated the update of their mobile number and email, enabling password recovery.

Upon successfully restoring their user ID and password, the complainant accessed their IRIS account only to find that their sales tax return for September 2023 had already been submitted. Disturbingly, the submitted return contained significant fictitious purchases and sales entries in the relevant annexures.