Dr Mahmud (left) and Loo after the talk
It’s that time of the year again when the government announces its annual budget plan. Therefore, in order to provide an understanding of the changes in the coming year’s budget proposal, UTAR’s Centre for Accounting, Banking and Finance (CABF) under the Faculty of Business and Finance (FBF) successfully organised a talk titled “2017 Budget and You” at Kampar Campus on 27 October 2016. The talk was delivered by Loo Thin Tuck, a lecturer from FBF who is also a professional accountant, tax consultant and GST consultant.
The talk was aimed to update UTAR staff and students with the Malaysian 2017 Budget proposals. In addition to that, the talk was also aimed to enhance their knowledge of the provisions of the Malaysian 2017 Budget.
Also present at the talk were FBF Deputy Dean for R&D and Postgraduate Programmes Dr Mahmud bin Hj Abd Wahab and Chairperson of CABF Dr Krishna Moorthy Manicka Nadar.
Loo commenced the talk by giving an introduction about the proposal of the Malaysian 2017 Budget and touched on the various aspects of its provisions. Among the topics discussed during the talk were government revenue, government expenditure, budget deficits, personal tax, goods and services tax (GST), GST collection and other relevant facets.
The participants benefitted enormously from the information and insights shared by the speaker. Among the highlights of the talk were:
- Budget
o Government revenue to be increased by RM7 billion, mostly
channeled to operating expenditure
o Deficit will be 3% compared to 3.1% in 2016
o Tax revenue will increase by RM13.4 billion, mainly from
corporate tax
o
GST collection expected to increase marginally, from RM38.5 billion to
RM40 billion
- Non-tax issues
o BR1M (Bantuan
Rakyat 1Malaysia) increased to RM1,200
o Book vouchers for college and university students will be
replaced by debit card, preloaded with RM250
- Personal tax
o Tax borne by employer on benefits extended to employees will be treated as income of the employees. Eg. Gifts above RM500 given to the employees by the employer whereby the employer absorbed the Output Tax. This Output Tax will be treated as income of the employees
o Books relief, sports equipment relief, computer relief and broadband subscription relief is combined and renamed as Lifestyle Relief. Maximum claim is limited to RM2,500. Lifestyle relief will also cover the purchase of newspaper, smartphone, tablet and gymnasium membership fee
o New relief: fees up to RM1,000 paid to child care centres registered with the Department of Social Welfare, for children up to 6 years old. Can only be claimed by either parent of the children
o New tax relief for purchase of breastfeeding equipment, up to RM1,000; only for women taxpayers with children up to two years old. Claimable once in two years
- Corporate tax
o Tax rate for first RM500k chargeable income of SME (paid up capital up to RM2.5million) reduced from 19% to 18%. Tax benefit is RM5,000
o Tax rates for non-SME (paid up capital more than RM2.5 million), reduced by 1% to 4% depending on percentage increase of chargeable income compared to immediate preceding year
o Double deduction for Structured Internship Program (SIP) is extended for three more years
The talk ended with an interactive Q&A session.
Loo explaining the provisions of the 2017 budget
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