Cashless payment for gov’t services pushed

MANILA, Philippines - An online petition filed through platform Charge.org is urging the government to initiate cashless transactions – such as credit card and online payments – for services offered by different agencies.

“Technology can make it possible now to trace every single transaction made, improving transparency in government,” said Carla Arriola in a petition that has gained 3,000 supporters as of yesterday.

“Car registrations need not be a burden because people will be able to pay with their credit limit. Taxes no longer have to be lumped with late fees because with available credit limit, people can pay now instead of waiting for available cash,” she added.

Arriola noted that the e-Commerce Act of 2002 “mandates all government services to be put online and until now we cannot even complete an entire transaction, including payment of fees, in any government website.”

“We fill out a form, we print it, we go to the office at the break of dawn, only to line up again,” she said.

Arriola said having cashless payments would reduce the risk of corruption and shelving of cash in the office because of bank closure after work hours.

“Billions upon billions of pesos are lost every year through pilferage. Lines are getting longer. Office operations still include counting bills and coins, paid for by the taxpayers’ money,” she said.

Various government agencies have launched mobile payment systems, such as the mobile money payment systems implemented by the Quezon City and the Valenzuela City governments.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) also has a mobile tax payment system that allows the public to settle various tax-related transactions through Globe’s G-Cash.

The bureau also has the electronic filing and payment system (eFPS), defined as the “electronic processing and transmission of taxpayer’s tax return information (including attachments) and taxes due to the government, made through the BIR website via the Internet.”

A memorandum, released through the BIR website, said all eFPS-registered tax payers who filed their returns and paid their income taxes on April 16 – a day after the deadline – will not be fined in view of the downtime of the system during the deadline.

Meanwhile, eFPS-enrolled taxpayers who filed their returns and paid their taxes manually were advised to re-file until April 25.