Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) commissioner Ceasar Dulay said government IT experts have been slow in resolving the agency’s tech issues following a glitch that affected government websites on July 3.
In a report to Department of Finance (DOF) secretary Carlos Dominguez III, Dulay said the BIR’s Information Systems Group (ISG) is still following up on their request to the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) to address the problem affecting its Electronic Tax Information System (eTIS).
“No formal reply yet from DICT, but we are in contact with them every day,” he said.
In a letter to DICT acting secretary Eliseo M. Rio Jr. dated July 18, Dulay noted that the DICT Data Center “houses and hosts the BIR core systems and certain eServices.”
He said a “major hardware meltdown” has prevented the BIR from accessing its eTIS “and is now causing an enormous disruption of eTIS operations, affecting taxpayers of Large Taxpayer Service (LTS) and Revenue Region 8 – Makati”.
This problem, he said, “will ultimately have dire consequences” on collections of in the business district. Thus, Dulay said he is asking DICT’s help in resolving the problem as soon as possible.
“We need the DICT Data Center Support Team to move more expediently, with urgency and to provide a timeline of activities on hardware restoration,” he added. — Joann Villanueva (PNA)
