THE performance evaluation system for Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and Bureau of Customs (BoC) personnel, as laid out by the Lateral Attrition Act of 2005, will be modified to account for prevailing economic conditions and how they may have affected collections.
The changes will come in the form of amended implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of Republic Act (RA) No. 9335. The new IRR was jointly issued Tuesday by the Department of Finance, the National Economic and Development Authority, the Budget department, Civil Service Commission, BIR and BoC.
Evaluations of collection performance, the main determinant of rewards or sanctions for employees of the two revenue agencies, will now incorporate an analysis of the impact of broader macroeconomic factors in the event of drastic swings in revenue. The analysis will also consider the impact of newly-signed laws on collections, in cases where the new laws were not taken into account by the Development Budget Coordination Committee when it set revenue targets.
RA 9335, signed in 2005, was designed to incentivize strong collection performance, though evaluations risk being skewed to the negative in a serious economic downturn, which could ultimately impact employee retention.
The revised IRR puts revenue district officers of the BIR and district or port collectors of the BoC who miss their targets by at least 7.5% at risk for possible separation proceedings. Such rulings may be appealed.
Meanwhile, the new rules also retain the formula for computing how much of the excess revenue goes into the Rewards and Incentives Fund: 15% of excess collections when the total exceeds the target by 30%; and 20% when the target is exceeded by more than 30%.
It also clarified that beneficiaries of the fund are not eligible for performance-based bonuses granted by the National Government to avoid duplication.
The new rules will take effect on April 20 or 15 days after its publication in a newspaper on Tuesday. — Beatrice M. Laforga