Cebu City fails to meet biz tax collection target

Cebu City has failed to reach its P5 billion business tax collection target for this month, but City Treasurer Diwa Cuevas said they’re still satisfied with the P640 million they managed to collect as of Saturday, Jan. 24.

“As long as the mayor sees that we really worked hard. We did our best to hit the target. But we’re still satisfied since our collection this year is more than the previous year,” Cuevas said.

Records show that the City Treasurer’s Office collected P596.8 million in the same period last year. The revenue came from business permit renewals that were processed at City Hall’s one-stop shop set up inside SM City Cebu.

The CTO has until Jan. 30 to collect business taxes. City Hall opened its one-stop shop last Jan. 5. Those who renewed their permits and have paid their fees and taxes on or before Jan. 23 will not be penalized with interest and surcharge.

Those who paid after Jan. 23 until Jan. 30 will be assessed with a 2 percent interest and a 25 percent surcharge.

For this year, the CTO was able to assess 25,294 businesses but as of latest data, only 24,368 businesses have paid taxes. This means close to 1,000 businesses haven’t paid yet.

“Businesses can opt to pay taxes quarterly. They might not have money right now or their checks might be rejected for some reason. But they will still pay. This just means they opted to be penalized with the interest and surcharge,” Cuevas explained.

She added that the CTO will be forming a team that will trace and inspect businesses with permits to be able to identify which businesses weren’t able to pay their taxes.