The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has ordered a crackdown on business establishments that have been using fake receipts and invoices printers.
In a statement, the BIR said fake receipts and invoice printers have been causing the government to lose billions of pesos annually.
"We will file criminal charges against them including tax evasion and falsification of public documents," said BIR Commissioner Romeo D. Lumagui, Jr.
BIR insiders said the tax dodging racket has been going on for years, but was only confirmed last Friday when BIR and National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) operatives raided the office of Brenterprise International, Inc., inside a condominium unit in Eastwood, Quezon City and seized hundreds of thousands of spurious sales booklets
The NBI placed under custody 36 digital printers of the company for further investigation.
Lumagui, who led the raiding team, said the firm allegedly manufacture the fake documents and sale them to business operators for the latter to claim deduction for expenses on transactions that never occurred.
He said the same documents are used to claim refunds as input value-added tax.
He initially estimated revenue losses from merchants using fake receipts and invoices allegedly from Brenterprise at P45 billion.
Lumagui added the invoices and receipts bore the names of non-existing businesses which shrewd traders also employ to cover the sources of smuggled and other untaxed goods sold to customers.