BOC off to a good start, overshoots January target by P6 billion

THE tax collection campaign of the Bureau of Customs (BOC) for this year is off to a good start after overshooting its January assigned target by more than P6 billion.

Assistant Commissioner and spokesperson, Atty. Vincent Maronilla, citing the preliminary report from the BOC-Financial Service, said last month’s actual collection reached P58.158 billion from their assigned target of P52.123 billion for a positive deviation of 11.58 percent.

Maronilla added that 14 out of the BOC’s 17 collection districts hit their respective assigned targets, namely:

The Ports Subic, San Fernando, POM, MICP, Batangas, Legaspi, Iloilo, Cebu, Surigao, Zamboanga, Davao, Clark, Aparri and Limay.

The BOC is the government’s second largest tax collection agency, after the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR). Both are attached agencies of the Department of Finance.

Maronilla stressed that for the past 2 years, the BOC was able to surpass its annual target collection, even registering a positive deviation of 6.23 percent in 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic that forced the government to impose a nationwide lockdown.

Last year, the BOC surpassed its annual revenue target with a 4.7 percent positive deviation from its official target of P616.45.785 billion, after actual cash collection totaled P645.785 billion or a surplus of P29.046 billion.

For 2022, the BOC is tasked to collect P679 billion.

In a press briefing last January 27, 2022, Comm. Rey Leonardo Guerrero, expressed confidence their new assigned target is “doable,” even claiming he has come out with their own “internal target” of P699 billion or P20 billion more than the official target (Paul M. Gutierrez).