Banks asked to submit statements of deceased

MANILA, Philippines - The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) is requiring banks to submit statement of accounts of deceased persons in the last five years as part of efforts to boost collections from estate taxes.

BIR Commissioner Kim Henares said the move also aims to determine whether banks have been conniving with the heirs of the deceased to evade tax obligations.

Henares pointed out that the bank secrecy law is automatically lifted once a person dies.

“We’re asking banks to give us the bank statements of those who have died in the past several years. We want to know whether they are compliant or allowing the heirs of the deceased to withdraw money,” she said.

The BIR chief said banks would be held criminally liable if found colluding with the heirs of the dead to circumvent the law.

“We will require them to submit the statement of accounts, if they don’t, we will subpoena them,” Henares said.

Under the law, the heirs of the deceased need to file an estate tax return where the gross value of the estate exceeds P200,000 and where the estate consists of registrable property, motor vehicle, share of stocks and other similar property as a precondition for the transfer of ownership.

The estate tax return should be filed within six months from the decedent’s death. However, the BIR, may grant extension not exceeding 30 days.

Some try to evade this provision by withdrawing the accounts of the deceased without first declaring to the banks the incident of death.

Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima said the agency is closely working with the BIR to help raise additional revenues for the government.

Purisima said yearly collections from estate tax had been very low except in 2012, where the figure was 60 percent higher than what was collected the previous year.

He said collections from estate taxes account for only less than one percent of the BIR’s total revenues.

Purisima said the government’s goal is to increase estate tax collections amid a resurgent property market and low interest rate environment.