THE Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) collected P24.815 million in abatement fees from micro taxpayers in the first two months of implementing its one-time abatement program, which seeks to help settle old tax liabilities and penalties.
The main tax-collecting agency reported last Tuesday that the program had drawn 6,234 applications covering P84.509 million in liabilities and penalties.
Of the 6,234 applications received from 1,352 taxpayers, 5,000 had been approved by the BIR.
Internal Revenue Commissioner Charlito Martin R. Mendoza issued Revenue Regulation 4-2026 last June 18, 2026, allowing micro-sized taxpayers and small-scale businesses to resolve their outstanding tax liabilities.
Taxpayers whose gross sales do not exceed P3 million per year and whose covered total basic tax liabilities and/or penalties do not exceed P80,000 may avail of the one-time tax abatement program until December 31, 2026.
‘We encourage taxpayers who qualify to avail while there is still time. This is an opportunity to settle covered liabilities, clean up old tax records, and move forward in compliance,’ Mendoza said.
Those with delinquent accounts or assessments, whether preliminary or final and whether disputed or not, as well as open stop-filer cases, including those taxpayers who have already ceased business operations, as of December 31, 2025, are eligible for abatement.
Taxpayers must file an application for abatement with the appropriate Revenue District Office having jurisdiction over them and pay a P5,000 one-time abatement fee for each approved application.
‘Our directive to our Revenue Regions and Revenue District Offices is not to simply wait for taxpayers to come to us. We should identify through our system those who are qualified to avail of the program, reach out to them, and guide them in settling their covered liabilities, regularizing their records, and returning to compliance,’ Mendoza said.
The abatement fees collected will boost the BIR’s revenue take, which reached P1.989 trillion as of end-July, up 5.31 percent from the P1.889 trillion it raised in the same period a year ago.