NBR simplifies process to get vat rebate of electricity bills paid through MFS

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has made the vat rebate process easier against electricity bills paid through Mobile Financial Service (MFS).

Under the new process, VAT authority will acknowledge the invoice for rebate, issued by MFS after payment of electricity bill through MFS. As a result, businesses can take the rebate through that invoice, which was not possible earlier.

The VAT Department of NBR on 20 September issued a directive which comes after the government made a change in this regard through the finance act in the last budget.

Earlier, any company could claim rebate only after paying the bill as per the invoice issued by the related power department. There was no scope to claim vat rebate as per law against bills paid through MFS, though paying bills through MFS is becoming popular.

A senior official of NBR told The Business Standard that, according to existing VAT law, some companies are eligible for vat rebate. But other than the power department invoice, we (VAT department) did not accept this as an appropriate document for rebate. Now, it would be easy for the vat payer to get back rebates, especially for businesses.

He said, for example, an organisation wants to pay the bill of Dhaka Power Distribution Company Limited (DPDC) through the MFS service provider 'bkash' using Grameen phone wallet. The customer can take rebate against the invoice (as per specified format) given by the MFS, like bkash.