THE Senate’s three top leaders on Tuesday filed a measure extending the period of amnesty for estate tax, the counterpart of which was passed a day earlier on third and final reading by the House of Representatives.
As filed by Senate President Juan Miguel F. Zubiri, Senate President Pro Tempore Loren Legarda and Majority Leader Joel J. Villanueva, Senate Bill (SB) 2170, soon as enacted into law, will extend to June 14, 2025, the availment of the existing estate tax amnesty.
According to the Senate leadership, granting the extended amnesty deadline was intended to grant taxpayers more time to to settle tax dues they failed to settle on time amid the Covid-19 contagion.
Covered by the tax amnesty deadline extension are estates and real properties that failed to settle tax dues until December 31, 2021.
Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) data provided to the Senate showed 134,000 taxpayers with back-taxes due availed of the amnesty since 2019 allowing the BIR to collect P7.4-billion, way past the agency’s P6.28-billion target.
Need for another extension
THE filing of SB 2170 came a day after a total of 259 lawmakers voted last Monday for the approval of House Bill (HB) 7909, which provides for extending the estate tax amnesty for another two years and seen to benefit almost a million families.
“They [the families] have barely recovered from the Covid-19 pandemic, and the amnesty deadline, which had been extended once, is just a month away. It’s on June 14. Thus, the need for another extension,” Speaker Martin G. Romualdez said.
The Speaker appealed to the intended amnesty beneficiaries to take advantage of the new extension if the measure gets enacted into law.
He also urged the BIR to simplify the amnesty application procedure and allow online filing, especially for heirs who are overseas Filipino workers.
“Let us not make the situation more difficult for them by extending the period for them to avail themselves of those benefits,” Romualdez added.
HB 7909 effectively amended Section 6 of Republic Act (RA) 11213 (as amended).
The measure also seeks to expand the coverage of amnesty-eligible estates to those whose descendants died on December 31, 2021, from the current December 31, 2017, coverage.
Image credits: Senate PRIB
