BIR says it will meet its May collection goal

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) is confident of meeting its P89.72-billion collection goal for May despite not having been able to attain its target last April. BIR Commissioner Kim Henares said everyone in the agency "is working hard" to meet the revenue collection goal for the month. Henares said the agency failed to meet its April target due to the low disbursements of the government, on top of lower volumes of Treasury bills and bonds sold by the Bureau of the Treasury. Tax collections from Treasury bills and bonds, for instance, fell below the P1.32-billion target in April. "As far as the BIR is concerned, the shortfall does not relate to our efficiency," Henares stressed. She said the BIR is also determined to surpass the P79-billion May collection in 2010, given improvements in efficiency of the collection agency. In April, the BIR collected only P103.39 billion, or P1.73 billion short of its goal for the month. The April collections brought the January-to-April revenues to P302.94, or P781 million higher than the target for the period. It surpassed the year-ago figures by P37.9 billion or 14.3 percent. —JMT/VS, GMA News