News Brief

Six employees suspended

THREE job-order and three regular employees of Mandaue City Hall were suspended for five days after being caught accepting concessions inside the VIP room of a karaoke TV bar in the city’s North Reclamation Area.

City Treasurer Regal Oliva said the employees were tasked to monitor  the number of guests that patronize night clubs and KTV bars.

The collection of entrance fees  would be used as basis for computing  their amusement taxes, Oliva said.

The workers’ names were withheld pending  investigation. The  case was endorsed to the mayor’s office and the City Legal Office.

Oliva said the employees, who belonged to a 20-person monitoring team,  were guilty of accepting concessions from the clubs and bars.

“I caught them with my own two eyes. It  was reported by their team leader so I went there,” Oliva said.

Oliva also said the Treasurer’s Office will also  evaluate whether Pacific Grand Mall and Robinland establishments are exempted from tax payments  due to their claims that they are accredited by the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza).

He said Peza establishments  used as business process outsourcing (BPO) offices  will be exempted.  Reporter Jucell Marie P. Cuyos

Stamped booklets

WHAT’S wrong with these ticket numbers?

A towing firm passed 50,000 booklets of receipts to the Mandaue City Treasurer’s Office that were later found to contain last year’s serial numbers.

Mandaue City Treasurer Regal Oliva said they regulated the release of the stamped booklets, issuing only 50 stamped receipts to Jadewell Towing Corp.

The firm asked for another 50 stamped receipts but Oliva said they won’t be released pending the remittance of the 50 used booklets.

“Pending the remittance of their previous used booklets, the company will not release another 50 stubs,” Oliva said.

He said Jadewell blamed the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and the printing press since their records didn’t match.

“If we will be giving them all the stubs, we will also be questioned by the Commission on Audit (COA) due to the duplicated serial numbers. They will also have a hard time in identifying if the stabs were released last year or this year,” Oliva said.

He said the company could easily avoid payment and claim that the receipts were issued last year and not counted to the remittances. Reporter Jucell Marie P. Cuyos