3 Unibanks among top taxpayers

Three universal banks were among the country's top 10 corporate taxpayers last year, International Revenue Commissioner Dakila Fonacier said yesterday.

The three are Bank of the Philippine Islands, Land Bank of the Philippines and Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co.

Other companies in the list are ABS-CBN Corp., the country's largest television network; Coca-Cola Corp., a leading softdrink firm; Manila Electric Co., the country's biggest power utility firm; Nestle Philippines Inc., a food manufacturing/processing firm; Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co., the country's largest telephone firm; Procter and Gamble Philippines Inc., producer of soap and health products; and Wyeth Phils., manufacturer of health products.

The BIR chief said it was President Estrada himself who awarded the top 10 taxpayers during the kick-off ceremony of BIR's year 2000 income tax filing season.

The 10 top taxpayers, in turn, pledged to help the government in sustaining economic development through utmost cooperation and uncomprising commitment to national revenue laws.

During the kick-off ceremony, the BIR signed a memorandum of assistance with four big business organizations, namely the Management Association of the Philippines, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Tax Management Association of the Philippines.

The ceremony also highlighted the signing of a joint circular containing the guidelines in the remittances of all taxes withheld by National Government Agencies (NGAs) to the BIR by the Department of Finance (DOF) and the Commission on Audit (COA).

The joint circular is designed to improve tax collection procedures for all taxes withheld by NGAs and accurately reflect revenues of government at any particular time.

"This is a new landmark issuance which will definitely improve tax collection effort of the BIR," Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno, in a separate statement, said.

Under this new procedure, all current and prior years' taxes actually withheld from government transactions such as tax on compensation, value added tax and percentage taxes will be netted out of the total Notice of Cash Allocations of agencies and will be remitted to the BIR through a separate and distinct disbursements document or tax remittances advice (TRA).