Introduction
Outsourcing the corporate tax compliance function, thereby
enabling organisational focus on core growth drivers, is
increasingly popular, given the efficiency and strategic business
benefits. This column examines its more controversial cousin - the
outsourcing of tax administration. The propriety of this
(particularly tax assessment and collection) had been brought into
bold relief by divergent practices of consultants variously engaged
to help shore up internally generated revenues (IGRs) from taxes,
rates and levies.
This trend seemed to have started in early 1990s: as a result of
low revenues, Governments were attracted by proposals from
consultants to help actualise accelerated internally generated
revenue (IGR) potential collections. Indeed, prior to return of
civilian administration in 1999, almost all the Governments
(including Federal) had signed on tax consultants to boost their
revenues.
