DOF reports high tax stamp rule compliance

COMPLIANCE with the tax stamp system for cigarettes remains high, covering over 99 percent of packs nationwide as of mid-March, latest data from the Department of Finance (DOF) and the World Bank showed.

During the week of March 20, 99.6 percent of cigarette packs in retail outlets complied with the Internal Revenue Stamps Integrated System (Irsis) on tobacco products, which the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has been implementing since late 2014. Irsis is aimed at ensuring the collection of correct excise taxes from tobacco products.

All 13 brands monitored—Boss, Camel, Champion, Fortune, Hope, LA, Mark, Marlboro, Mighty, More, Philip Morris, Plaza and Winston—have more than 95 percent up to 100 percent of their inventories bearing stamps.

Last year, the BIR tightened its monitoring of cigarette firms’ tax payments through Irsis, after tens of thousands of unstamped packs were confiscated in provinces such as Batangas and Nueva Ecija.

The tax stamp system would also cover alcoholic drinks within this year, BIR Commissioner Kim S. Jacinto-Henares earlier said.

Henares had said the BIR and industry players were still fine-tuning the process of affixing tax stamps on bottles of distilled spirits and wines so that production at factories would not be affected by the stamping process.

The World Bank and the DOF are expected to soon come out with a joint report on the implementation of the Sin Tax Reform Law.

Sin tax reforms restructured the excise tax rates slapped on tobacco and alcohol in order to discourage vice. Revenues collected would be poured into healthcare.

The implementation of higher excise taxes on so-called “sin” products lifted the tax take by 37.4 percent to P18.5 billion during the first two months of 2016, BIR data showed.

The total amount of excise taxes collected from tobacco, fermented liquor as well as compounded liquor and distilled spirits as of end-February not only exceeded the actual collections of P13.4 billion a year ago but also exceeded the two-month target of P16.2 billion.