Ghana Revenue Authority kickstarts process to tax online businesses including those on Facebook

Deputy Commissioner at the Large Taxpayer Office at the GRA, Edward Gyamerah made the revelation at a press briefing.

According to him, although some analysts have cast doubt about the GRA’s ability to monitor and tax online businesses due to the nature of cyberspace, the GRA is keen to drafting modalities which will enable it to tax online businesses.

“Currently, we have a project team that is looking at how to tax the digital economy. The project team is working on developing modalities. We hope that they will come out with their draft for us to share with stakeholders,” he said.

Millions of commercial transactions take place on the internet every day. Hundreds of businesses operating on the internet have virtually no boundary or monitored to ascertain the volume or value of those transactions.

With the growth of Cyberspace, a lot of businesses operating in Ghana, are veering away from the conventional way of selling in shops to posting their products and services on the internet; a move that makes it difficult for the GRA in its quest to widen the tax net.

Notwithstanding, the Deputy Commissioner said there is the capacity to achieve the aim.

“It’s not peculiar to Ghana. It’s a challenge across the world. And so, what they will need is more support in terms of recruiting IT experts who can assist them in tracking and tracing some of the operators on the digital platforms,” he said.