T

he Jakarta Tax Agency has begun to install 5,555 point of sale (POS) devices in restaurants and non-starred hotels to record transaction history and send the data directly to the agency'€™s data center, in a drive to ensure tax compliance.

Tax Agency head Agus Bambang Setyowidodo said during the first installation process at Pelangi restaurant in Central Jakarta on Tuesday that the devices would send the transaction data directly to the data center.

'€œAs such, we'€™ll have the initial data on how much the owners should be paying in tax,'€ he said, adding that the owners would pay their monthly tax bill by transferring the money through one of 12 banks cooperating with the agency.

Agus added that with the online system, taxpayers did not need to meet with tax officials, minimizing potential for tax fraud.

His agency, he added, aimed to complete the distribution of the 5,555 POS devices by February.

According to Agus, the agency lists 10,900 restaurants, hotels and entertainment spots in the capital as taxpayers.

'€œPOS have been installed in around 4,600 places by state-owned Bank Rakyat Indonesia [BRI],'€ he said.

He added that BRI initially wanted to equip every restaurant, hotel and nightspot in the city with POS devices, but could not afford to. '€œAs such, we allocated Rp 46 billion [US$3.35 million] to buy the devices and establish the system to cover the rest of the places,'€ he said.

Pelangi restaurant owner Mince Phieter said that she had been looking to use an online system for seven years.

'€œI worked in a bank for 25 years. I know that the online system is the best way to collect tax,'€ she said, adding that she would now receive comprehensive transaction and income data.

Mince said that she was also glad not to have to meet with tax officials any longer. '€œHonestly, I don'€™t like meeting tax officials. Quite often they refuse to believe my data; they act like police officers,'€ she said.

Mince said that she hoped that with the online system, it would be easier for her to meet her obligations.

She also hoped that the city administration would improve the facilities in the city to compensate taxpayers. '€œWe have been diligently paying our taxes but we rarely see any developments or service improvements,'€ she said.

She also advised the city administration to implement progressive taxation. '€œThe tax for those who buy a simple bowl of noodles and those who eat at expensive hotels should be different,'€ she said.

Judi Achmadi, the CEO of IT company Telkomsigma, which provides the system, said that the system would use cellphone signals to send the data.

'€œThe server from the restaurant will send the data to the server in the tax agency,'€ Judi said.

He added that the POS devices were also equipped with batteries and could record data even if the signal was disturbed, sending it once the signal was retrieved.

The Jakarta Tax Agency has recorded that restaurant tax revenue reached Rp 2.25 trillion in 2015, surpassing its target of Rp 2.1 trillion, while hotel tax revenue conversely fell short of the targeted Rp 1.5 trillion, reaching Rp 1.4 trillion.