The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has disclosed it will, by the end of this year, eliminate all paperwork, to begin full digital and paperless processes in revenue mobilisation.
Mr. Henry Yentumi, Technical Advisor to the Commissioner General of GRA, who made this known at the Ghana Economic Forum (GEF), said it is to allow Ghanaians to be able to be access their Tax Identification Number (TIN) from their homes, schools and offices when the public sector reform process kicks off.
The GRA, this year, commenced processes to educate businesses in the informal sector on TIN registration and data collection to increase their tax compliance.
The Domestic Tax Revenue Division (DTRD) of the GRA had, as at April, migrated 67 tax offices across the country onto the Total Revenue Integrated Processing Systems (tripsTM) for revenue collection.
This was with support from its technical partner, the Ghana Community Network Services Limited (GCNet).
TripsTM is software for tax administration designed and deployed by GCNet as a business automation process system that seeks to streamline and bring transparency into the operations of the GRA DTRD by eliminating the use of paper in the processes of tax administration.
Completion of the nationwide rollout of tax offices shall ensure that the whole country is covered to broaden the tax base and also facilitate the Tax Identification Number (TIN) registration.
The Authority has so far issued over a million taxpayers with a new TIN since the introduction of the regime.
Government began the implementation of the paperless clearing system on September 1, 2017, to speed up the process of clearing goods from two weeks to four hours, and ensure order at the port, whilst blocking loopholes.
Some stakeholders, however, had earlier protested over some delays in the implementation of the paperless system since its inception.
Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia last year claimed that an initial assessment of the implementation of the paperless system at the country’s ports, had shown a revenue collection improvement of 56 percent.
He disclosed that revenue at the ports increased from GHS130 million in the first week of September 2016, to GHS213 million in the same period for 2017.
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