Tonight, businesses are questioning whether they are being assessed fairly by the Department of General Sales Tax. This is after a letter emerged from a sales tax employee saying the department managers just want to charge businesses as much as possible, and will use any assessment formula to do so.
GST Officer Elmer Reyes from Punta Gorda wrote the four page letter to the Solicitor General in December. He asks whether the Management of the Department should be allowed to influence the assessments made by the department's auditors.
Reyes paints a very disturbing picture where he claims higher up's in the department have forced him to use dubious means of assessment to come up with the highest GST charge for businesses. He says he argued the point to his superiors, but was quickly shut down - and told to use the method they prescribe - even if he couldn't find it in any accounting book.
But, he says that when that same method resulted in a lesser charge for businesses, or that the Sales Tax Department would have to give a refund, management again told him to change to another method of assessment so that the business would end up paying the maximum charge.
And, the way that Reyes frames it - the business is usually none the wiser, especially if they don't have their own accountant. He says he was instructed not to show them the method used for assessment.
Now, this would account for some serious accounting malpractice in the private sector - and it's very shady behavior for any public agency. But, there are two sides to every story. We did try and speak to the Director of General Sales Tax Ms. Betty Ann Jones, but we were told that she is not in office.
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