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Minister Patrick Chinamasa

Oliver Kazunga, Senior Business Reporter
COMPANIES have up to tomorrow to comply with the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra)’s fiscalisation process or risk being penalised.

The tax authority has also warned that it will not issue tax clearance certificates to non-compliant businesses starting January 2017.

Fiscalisation entails the use of electronic fiscal devices or machines by businesses for efficient management controls in areas of sales analysis and stock control system.

Zimra said the fiscalisation process was a priority engagement in line with the 2017 national budget, which was presented by Finance and Economic Development Minister Patrick Chinamasa recently.

“All clients registered for Value Added Tax (VAT) under category C and who were fiscalised in terms of the VAT regulations of 2010 but have not yet interfaced or linked their fiscal devices with the Zimra server, should do so by January 2017,” said Zimra in a notice.

“Failure to interface fiscal devices with the Zimra server by 31 December 2016 may result in Zimra not issuing tax clearance certificates for the year 2017, and may also attract appropriate penalties.”

Companies that fall in category C are those with an annual turnover of $240 000.

Zimra has also reminded clients in VAT categories A, B and D that they are expected to fiscalise their operations by January 2017.

Categories A and B are those registered operators who are submitting returns after every two months while category D clients submit returns on a seasonal basis, or as agreed with the Commissioner General.

In 2010, the Government introduced the fiscalisation programme to unplug loopholes in the VAT payment system thereby enhancing revenue collection.

In the 2017 national budget, Minister Chinamasa indicated that about 90 percent of category C operators have already acquired fiscalised devices but connection to the ZIMRA server has been slow due to resistance by some of the operators.

“Non-compliance has undermined the ability of Zimra to monitor vatiable transactions in real time,” he said.

As a result of poor revenue performance between January and October, collections during the period under review stood at $2.876 billion against a target of $3.158 billion.

This resulted in the 2016 national budget experiencing a revenue shortfall of $282.5 million, said the minister.

— @okazunga.