‘We Obey Full Compliance With Tax Stamp Policy’ – Accra Brewery

Accra Brewery Limited’s has debunked media news that, the company is refusing to comply with the  Ghana Revenue Authority’s (GRA) in relation to the tax stamp policy

The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) earlier threatened to sue Accra Breweries Ltd (ABL) over “illegal” tax stamps found in one of its warehouses at Gbawe in Accra.

A team comprising the Excise Unit and the GRA Task Force on Tuesday, November 6 inspected retail centers to ensure compliance with excise tax stamp policy in the capital.

At the Gbawe warehouse of ABL, the team discovered that tons of crates of Club Beer and Voltic Mineral Water, among other beverages, which did not have the tax stamps affixed on them, were being loaded onto trucks for distribution.

The officials acted swiftly to confiscate the products and engaged the management in a dialogue.

However in a statement from the Brewery company, it states ”ABL wishes to state that its decision to provide tax stamps to the company’s key distributors were borne out of a genuine intention to comply with the GRA’s directives to all manufacturers to ensure that their products were affixed with tax stamps before they could be sold on the market. As you may already be aware, the GRA on 2^nd October 2018 commenced an enforcement exercise which led to the prevention of the sale of excisable products without tax stamps.”

According to them, the company has ensured full compliance with the tax stamp policy since October 2018 as all products leaving our brewery from the period of enforcement have  been affixed with the appropriate tax stamps.

”Further, we wish to state that the decision to apply the tax stamps on old stock has not led to the loss of excise tax revenue due GRA from ABL. ABL in line with the excise legislation of the country calculates and remits its taxes to the Ghana Revenue Authority on a monthly basis.

As a result, the excise taxes due on the products in the warehouse of our KDS have already been remitted to the GRA in line with the excise tax laws. We also would like to state that the GRA has resident excise officers on ABL’s premises who ensure the correct excise amount is declared and paid to the GRA on a monthly basis. As the GRA itself has indicated, the excise tax stamp policy does not create a new tax but rather serves as another level of compliance for excise taxes.” – the statement further indicated.