Customs agencies remain distrustful, banks’ guarantee becomes useless
Customs agencies remain distrustful, banks’ guarantee becomes useless
Customs agencies refuse commercial banks’ guarantees for enterprises’ tax payment, requesting enterprises to pay tax before getting customs clearance.
Analysts have noted that a lot of troubles have arisen when the Tax Management Law took effects on July 1, 2013.
A representative of the Anh Quan International Trade Company in Tay Ho district in Hanoi, specializing in importing frozen food for re-export later, complained that the bank guarantee is “valueless” in the eyes of customs agencies.
The company got the tax payment guarantee from Agribank Hanoi, hoping that the guarantee would allow it to arrange capital to do business, because it does not have to pay tax immediately to the customs agencies.
In order to get the guarantee, the company has mortgaged all of its assets at the bank.
However, though showing the bank’s guarantee, the company could not get the temporary imports cleared from the Hai Phong customs agency. The customs officers, citing the Dispatch No. 6615 issued by the city’s customs agency, which took effects on August 13, requested the company to pay tax for the temporary imports. The tax would be refunded later when the company re-exports the consignments of imports.
As a result, the company could not arrange VND2-3 billion to pay tax to get the imports cleared. As the imports were left at the port, the company had to pay for the container storage fees, estimated at VND4-5 million a day, which was a big loss to the enterprise.
The representative of the company said he cannot understand why the laws accept banks’ guarantees, but customs agencies do not.
A lot of other companies also complained that the customs clearance has got stagnant.
A senior executive of the Ha Thanh General Trade Company headquartered in Hanoi, also a frozen food trader, said the tax payment to the accounts of Hai Phong City’s customs sub-agencies is carried out at the state treasury.
It takes enterprises a lot of time to make payment there, which leads to the slow customs clearance. Meanwhile, enterprises want to clear goods as soon as possible to save time and money.
After paying cash, enterprises would have to wait 20-30 days to get the tax refund. As a result, enterprises’ money gets stuck at taxation bodies, and they don’t have working capital to continue their projects.
A senior official of the Ministry of Industry and Trade noted that the problem lies in the procedures set up by customs agencies. The provisions of the Dispatch 6615 released on August 12 show that the customs agencies don’t accept the tax payment guarantees granted by commercial banks.
As such, the enterprises which import products for re-export will have to arrange big sums of money to pay tax, while they will lack capital for business. They need to wait 25-30 days to get tax refund, or get money back to be able to put into business.
The Ministry of Industry and Trade has reportedly requested the Ministry of Finance to reconsider the tax payment procedures and allow the enterprises which import products for re-export later, to use banks’ guarantees for tax payment. Meanwhile, enterprises cannot do anything else than waiting.
vietnamnet
