Gordon seeks tax fraud raps vs. 5 motorcycle dealers

Senator Richard Gordon on Saturday pushed for the filing of tax fraud complaints against five motorcycle dealers who allegedly defrauded the government of billions of pesos from selling motorcycles.

Gordon issued the statement after the Department of Finance endorsed to the Bureau of Internal Revenue the lodging of tax fraud charges against the motorcycle distributors.

“The BIR should lose no time in running after these motorcycle dealers who cheated the government of billions of pesos worth of revenue that could have been used in its pandemic response,” Gordon, Senate blue ribbon committee chairman, said.

Last September 13, the DOF endorsed to the BIR the complaint of Land Transportation Office (LTO) 7 Regional Director Victor Emmanuel Caindec against motorcycle dealers reportedly owned by a Mindanao-based family.

Caindec said the motorcycle dealers allegedly issued “double invoices containing different invoice numbers, dates, fraudulent misdeclaration of actual place of sale, and even total purchase of price” of the sold motorcycles.

The dealers were identified as Du Ek Sam Inc., Desmark Corporation, DES Marketing Inc., Premio Corporation, and DES Strong Inc. which reportedly abused LTO’s MAIRDOEs (manufacturers, assemblers, importers, rebuilders, dealers, and other entities) system.

Under the MAIRDOES system, motorcycle dealers would get the installment money from motorcycle buyers without providing registration papers or license plates. Instead, the motorcycle buyer only gets invoices for his purchase.

Also, instead of registering a motorcycle after being sold, the dealer holds the registration documents so that if the owner did not pay the monthly  amortization fee, the dealer will get the motorcycle again and sell it again as a demonstration unit.

The five dealers allegedly sell the motorcycle units to Filipinos in need of mobility at exorbitant installment rates of 36%. They allegedly favor the delays in the release of plates and registration papers as they issue only invoices to customers, which deprived the government of revenues.

Gordon said the tax fraud complaint was the result of the previous Senate panel probe looking into LTO and dealers' delay of the Motorcycle Crime Prevention Act earlier this year. —Consuelo Marquez/KG, GMA News