Stanbic Bank and the tax body, the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) have today added onto their digital business solutions an e-tax payments platform that will enable Ugandan taxpayers to remit their taxes using VISA, MasterCard and MTN Mobile Money.
This new innovation could go a long the way to show a transformative path of ICT with officials revealing that the new platform has already registered significant returns now in billion of shillings.
On the platform URA has been able to collect up to UGX 5.4 billion out of mobile or online transaction related payments. Patrick Mukiibi, URA’s Commissioner Tax Investigations said at a press conference that “when the public learnt about the Stanbic Bank platform, they said, why not apply it as well? We, got about UGX 74 million in just over a month.”
The CEO Stanbic Bank Uganda, Mr Mweheire Patrick said that they expect to maintain their market share which is roughly a third of the tax collections. “But what is happening is that the mode of payment is shifting from cash into something digital. What that does for the bank is that it lowers our costs to serve because you don’t have to come into the branch or talk to somebody or get in-line for an hour to make a tax payment. So it is convenient to the customer and we hope we have happier customers and it is also good for us in that we can give away some of these routine payments from the branches into a digital platform” he added.
The tax body is optimistic that this platform in the long run, will help boast remittances from numerous agencies and individuals seeking to make e-payments with ease. URA also noted that most of the tax payments are those that are associated with Kampala City (KCCA), NIRA and also passport related. Direct taxes for far are quiet few but URA expects to have these numbers improve after this official launch.
Officials also revealed that the new online solution that only supports MTN mobile money will add other service providers like Airtel Money and Africell.
