Welcome

Dennis Jones is a Jamaican-born international economist, who has lived most of the time in the UK and USA, and latterly in Guinea, west Africa. He moved back to the Caribbean in 2007. This blog contains his observations on life on this small eastern Caribbean island, as well as views on life and issues on a broader landscape, especially the Caribbean and Africa.

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Saturday, April 18, 2009

Taxing Times In Barbados-Redux

No sooner had I published the previous post than I noticed in today's Advocate that Barbados' Inland Revenue Department (IRD) has extended the tax deadline to May 15, "to facilitate...filing online", but covers those filing in paper and electronic form.

Likewise, another friend sent me an interesting note. The company for whom she works attended a meeting last autumn where the IRD exposed the etax system to employers. Offers were made to the IRD to test the site for them (as employers and as personal tax filers) since there were aspects that they had not taken into account and the testers could identify the kinks. The IRD reportedly told those making the offer that they had to launch and that there was no time for testing. The IRD employees present took copious notes on issues raised, so you can imagine how many kinks were identified on the spot at first exposure.

The company's payroll department has made several attempts since January to register the company's information, then gave up because efiling was not working. He submitted the company's information manually as he has done in the past.

My friend spent a quarter hour this morning waiting to save her draft filing but gave up and will prepare the manual form tomorrow and mail it on Monday.

I think this is a subject I would like to raise or hear raised during the radio call-in programs in the coming week. Let's see what the IRD have to say for themselves.

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