NA Committee Directs FBR to Change Definition of Online Marketplace

The 61st meeting of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance and Revenue was held at Parliament House, Islamabad, under the chairmanship of Faiz Ullah, MNA. Minister Finance briefed the Committee about the dialogues with International Monitoring Fund (IMF). The Committee appreciated the briefing, however, indicated some anomalies concerning the budget 2021-22 and suggested the Minister to address the same. The Minister assured the Committee to remove all the anomalies. The Committee directed FBR to remove the definition of online marketplace Section 2 (18-A), the deemed retailer clause within the tier -1 retailer condition section (43-AF), and the changeability of sales tax proposal on online market places under section (3-3C) considered. The Committee directed FBR to remove the proposed withholding tax on un-registered sellers selling on the online market places in addition to the Committee observed that the FBR works with online marketplaces to increase the documentation of unregistered marketplace sellers. The Committee further recommended that this may be reconsidered in the future. The Committee directed the Ministry of Commerce and National Tariff Commission (NTC) to discuss and take all possible measures to remove anomalies in duty structure of tariff concerning Pakistan Custom Tariff (PCT) Codes 4411.9200, 4411.9310, 4411.9390 and 4411.9400) being intermediary in nature as presented by the stakeholders and recommend that same may be substituted to 11 percent so that level playing field in the business is provided to all the stakeholders. The Committee directed Chairman and Member (IR-Policy), FBR, to have a meeting with the stakeholders from Ginning Sector and Agriculture Sector regarding tax imposition on Agriculture implements and the representatives of Online Market Place. The meeting was attended by MNAs Dr. Aisha Ghous Pasha, Faheem Khan, Qaiser Ahmed Sheikh, Ali Pervaiz, Dr. Rameesh Kumar Vankwani, Ahsan Iqbal, Sadakat Ali Khan Abbasi, Jamil Ahmed Khan; and Minister for Finance and Revenue besides the senior officers from M/o Finance and Revenue, Federal Board of Revenue.