MRA seals The Palace Bar over tax non-compliance

Electronic fiscal device (EFD) receipt

By Elizabeth Mandala, MANA

Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) on Tuesday sealed The Palace Bar operating within Malawi Aid Society of Malawi (MASM) complex along Victoria Avenue in Blantyre for failure to settle a tax evasion penalty.

This follows a tip that was reported by a customer through the ‘Kuiphula Ndi Lisiti Langa’ promotion encourages the public to demand an electronic fiscal device (EFD) receipt after paying for goods in shops.

MRA’s Head of Corporate Affairs Steve Kapoloma said the Bar was given a period of 21 days to pay a K500,000 fine which it failed to comply and thus the decision “to seal the premises up until they settle the fee”.

Kapoloma said MRA is set seal 10 more shops this week who would failed to settle their deadlines to pay the fines imposed on them.

He warned all shops and companies that have been issued with penalties to comply by paying their fines before expiry of their deadlines.

‘Kuiphula Ndi Lisiti Langa’ campaign was introduced to raise awareness among consumers on the importance of demanding for an EFD receipt. It also encourages Value Added Tax (VAT) registered traders to issue receipts all the time.

If the receipt is not issued, consumers are to report to MRA and are rewarded with K40,000.

The campaign was launched on March 8 and by May, MRA reported that it rewarded 609 whistle blowers in Blantyre, Lilongwe, Zomba and Mzuzu cities.

In an interview with Malawi News Agency then, Kapoloma had said the campaign was yielding good results as the tax body transferred the mandate to follow up on the EFD receipts to the public.

He had said: “MRA is supposed to go shop by shop checking on this, unfortunately we cannot do this every day hence we deliberately launched the campaign to transfer our mandate to the public.”

MRA spent closer to K26 million to the 609 whistle blowers but in turn the revenue collector earned K347 million from the K500,000 fine from each defaulter.