IRS develops new software to facilitate tax returns

Cape Coast, Nov. 17, GNA - The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on Tuesday organized a day's workshop in Cape Coast to educate tax-payers in the informal sector on a new "Tax Helper Software" it has developed to facilitate the early submission of tax returns and subsequent payments.

The participants were mostly small and medium scale businessmen and women and school proprietors from the Central Region.

Mr Patrick Danso of the Management Information and Technical Department of the IRS briefed participants on the usefulness of the software and how it is installed on the computer.

He said it would replace the "IT form 51," which formerly enabled employers in the informal sector to manually file tax returns on their employees.

He explained that the nature of the old system that required the employers to, among other procedures, list and calculate the taxes of employees manually, was saddled with mistakes resulting in late submissions and payments of the taxes deducted to the IRS offices.

Mr Danso explained that the new system had an inbuilt calculator to help in the calculation of deducted taxes, a devise to indicate a taxable income as well as the capability to deduct the required social security fund.

He said the software would ensure that employers did "the right thing" and urged them to have the software installed on their computers to ensure timely submissions of their returns to avoid penalties.

Mr Joseph Akajusi, Regional Director of the IRS, who chaired the function, said the idea of introducing the software was to minimize errors associated with tax returns, save time and also ensure efficiency in the system.

He said delays in submitting the returns attracted 30 per cent of the total amount of tax to be paid by the employer and that with the new software, this would be "a thing of the past".

Mr Akajusi said in cases where some people were being under or over taxed, the software would detect it while rent elements and car allowances for instance, which were hitherto not included for tax would be captured.