File Your Tax Returns Early to avoid Penalties – KRA

The Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) has called on the over3.2 million taxpayers who filed their 2017 returns through iTax systems to start their 2018 submissions as early as now.

According to KRA, the deadline for filing the 2018 tax returns will be on 30^th June 2019 and that late submission of a tax return attracts a penalty of 2,000 shillings in case of individuals and 10,000 shillings or 5 percent of the tax due in any other case.

These punitive penalties are avoidable by filing tax returns in time.

The taxman is, therefore, urging all employers to issue P9 Certificates to their employees early enough to facilitate them in filing their 2018 individual income tax returns in time and avoid late filing penalty.

“KRA has enhanced iTax to have an auto-populated return of employment income. This has made it much easier, smoother and faster for employees whose source of income is only employed to file their returns. The employees are only required to input data on pension and annual relief. On receipt of the P9 certificates, the employees should simply proceed and file their returns accordingly,” read part of a statement from KRA.

Persons with employment and other sources of income are required to download excel sheet from iTax, fill in the required information offline and submit the return by easily loading it in iTax.

All PIN holders who have no source of income, for example, university or college students are required to file NIL returns.

“Taxpayers should note that filing of tax returns is a requirement for the issuance of a Tax Compliance Certificate (TCC) by KRA.” reads the statement.

In order to ensure efficient filing, KRA has provided nationwide support at the Tax Service Offices to those who may need assistance in filing. Taxpayers are encouraged to visit those offices for support in the filing of returns.