Review taxation regime for small businesses

Tax authorities and experts should be encouraged to increase their outreach programmes to educate business owners about taxation. [File, Standard]

Small and medium enterprises are feeling the pinch of a punitive taxation regime that slaps them with hefty fines even for minor infractions that sometimes are beyond their control. As such, it would be prudent, now that Kenyans are discussing the next Budget cycle, for Treasury policymakers and legislators to re-look the structure that adopts a default adversarial taxation approach towards small firms.

It is not that such businesses should be shielded from tax and penalties for delayed remittances. Rather, the policies, procedures and practices that deliberately set out to cripple small businesses for tax infractions should be reviewed with the aim of increasing compliance rather than intimidating business owners and treating them as suspects.