The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has issued a detailed procedure for sharing of information between the FBR and the banks about the declarations made by the civil servants in BS 17 – 22.
The FBR Thursday night issued “Sharing of Declaration of Assets of Civil Servants Rules, 2023”.
According to S.R.O. 76(I)/2023 issued by the FBR, the rules shall apply to sharing of information with banks. These rules shall apply for the limited purpose of sharing of information in respect of civil servants in BS 17 – 22. The FBR shall share a simplified or abridged version of the declaration, based on the fields agreed with the State Bank, made by a civil servant in his electronic declaration filed with FBR.
The bank shall determine in writing the reasons for which CDD requires that the information from FBR is to be accessed (the decision of the bank. The bank shall obtain express written consent from the civil servant of whom the bank intends to access information from FBR; and the bank shall obtain a certificate from the civil servant as per the prescribed format annexed duly signed by the person declaring that he is a civil servant of BS-17 and above, with his complete name, designation, employee number and all other particulars that are prescribed in the format.
The bank shall use a pre-notified, secured, and single authorized email address and the email account shall be under the control and responsibility of the head of compliance of the bank in terms of its authorization, use, and security of data being shared. The authorized email account shall be used for request or receipt of simplified declarations as envisaged under sub-rule (3) of the rule.
The bank shall communicate to the FBR the credentials of a maximum of four Focal Persons (officials) authorized to communicate with FBR through the authorized email. The following information shall be furnished by the bank in respect of focal persons.
The bank shall promptly communicate any change of Focal Persons’ credentials above and shall not allow using the secured email until the credentials have been communicated to the FBR.
The FBR shall provide simplified or abridged information, within five working days through the authorized email, or may refuse in case information is not available or cannot be provided due to any reason. In case of dispute, the decision of FBR shall prevail being a custodian of information.
The bank shall provide bi-annual feedback on the use of information received by the bank as well as on the outcome of CDD in terms of the success of new accounts opened and how the information helped the bank in establishing its client relationship. Case-wise feedback is to be provided by 31 July and 31 January of every year of the preceding six months’ information requests made by the bank.
The FBR shall have a dedicated Banks’ CDD desk assigned to an authorized officer supported by designated officials to deal with the information requests from the banks, FBR added.
