LRA introduces package to improve services

‘MAPALO NKHELOANE

MASERU – The Lesotho Revenue Authority, (LRA) has introduced a package of initiatives to ease clients’ lives, among which is the tax lottery.

this time bigger and better than before.

The tax lottery was introduced during the last financial year to promote tax compliance among its small and medium clients.

According to LRA’s Public Relations Officer, Pheello Mphana, the tax lottery is fulfilling its intended purpose since there has been significant improvement in compliance by taxpayers.

To promote compliance, last year a lucky client from Quthing walked away with a brand new Toyota car after his ticket was drawn at a lottery.

This year five brand new Nissan utility vans are up for grabs by five lucky clients who together with 20 others who were found eligible for the lottery during the preliminary draw. The LRA tax lottery grand draw will be held on July 13 at Maseru Mall.

Mphana revealed that the office of the auditor general will provide auditors to ensure transparency.

Small and medium clients are described by the LRA’s

Letsatsi Sepiriti who works in LRA’s Client Education Office said small to medium clients comprise those whose earnings annually are below M850 000 (for small clients) and between M850 000 and below M60 million (for medium clients).

Sepiriti also noted that the lottery is reserved for small and medium clients because they the ones that are usually behind as far as paying tax is concerned so the tax lottery acts as motivation.

LRA wants to increase client satisfaction rating of excellence from 10% to 60% by June 30, 2020. Last year’s survey revealed that only 10% of clients showed 100% satisfaction so the tax authority wants an improvement.

Central to the work done at LRA is tax clearance which causes tiring queues.

LRA has therefore ensured that tax clearance can now be done electronically which means that clients can now go to seek tax clearance online and even go to seek services with their unique reference without having to carry a printed document.

The client seeking services will only log onto LRA’s website, enter the person’s reference number and their status of compliance will show.

Another improvement introduced is the queue management system which allows clients to rate services rendered. LRA will monitor the clients’ feedback thereby helping improve in order to reach the 60% client satisfaction rating of excellence by 2020.

The client feedback tools will be found at service centres such as Maseru central, Maseru Mall LTD, Maseru mall SMTD, Mohale’s Hoek, Leribe, Maseru bridge and Van Rooyan’s Gate.