Rwanda Revenue Authority (RRA) is undertaking country-wide training for new taxpayers, focusing on tax matters, especially the use of electronic billing machines (EBM) in paying Value Added Tax.

The trainees registered their businesses last year.

The deputy commissioner in charge of taxpayer services at RRA, Drocella Mukashyaka, said a total of 25,000 taxpayers with new businesses will benefit from the training.

Addressing trainees from Gasabo District in Kigali on Thursday, Mukashyaka urged them to always pay taxes on time to avoid penalties.

She said it was a common challenge for some people to start a business without honouring their tax obligations.

"We want to help taxpayers to know their responsibilities, you find some getting confused on which tax they have to pay, how and when to pay,” she said.

"Last year some opened businesses without registering with RRA. Such a person could be penalised because our system regards that person among tax defaulters.”

Mukashyaka said, since they started the sensitisation, a number of taxpayers are now getting it right.

They are asking questions that we answer, it gives us hope that this year there will be a positive change in tax payments,” she added.

One of the trainees, Jean-Pierre Nduwumuremyi, who operates a shop in Kinyinya Sector in Gasabo District, said the training would help him to understand tax matters.

He appealed to fellow taxpayers to avoid evading taxes.

"We needed this training because some of us were ignorant even about the registration process. We also encountered challenges during clearing time but we are now knowledgeable and are going to educate others who don’t know,” said Christine Uwanyirigira, a saloon operator.

The most concerns from the traders were about the TIN number, EBM and VAT.

RRA estimates show that the number of EBM users increased from 11,436 in June 2016 to 12,805 by last December.

The tax revenue targets for the 2nd Semester 2016/17 fiscal year is Rwf588.1 billion.

The tax body hopes to enforce VAT input validation systems which started early this year as a strategy to increase VAT collection and automatically eliminate bogus VAT declarations and the corresponding claims of VAT refund.

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