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Showing posts from March, 2013

Busy March

It has been a busy month for Paul so far, that I have no time to update this blog of mine for the past month. IRAS VES Exercise I had gone for the training on 1 March, and was rather surprised that the IRAS trainers had made some basic mistakes during the training session. I was rather surprised that the trainers & officers still believe that I should have kept the errors under wraps. Personally I feel that the volunteers should be made known of all these errors as they may lead to the taxpayers doing the wrong thing under the wrong coaching of the trainers to the volunteers. Fortunately, the right thing was done in the end. I was rather surprised how some volunteers were doing the e-filing for the taxpayers. It is either the training was not well conducted, or some of them were sleeping when the lecture was conducted. How could such an important point, printing the consolidated statement for the taxpayer to verify if the entries entered are correct are missed out during prin

IRAS VES Training Session

I was not very keen to attend the session as they are covering the things that I know, by virtue that I am working in this line for the past 11 years and  I have been seething with anger about one of the fellow volunteers stealing away the other volunteer’s credit for the VES exercise the past two years mentioned in 2 blog posts ago. This year, I roped in 2 new friends of mine, Patricia & Baoshan  to join us as they are  interested to learn more about personal income tax. It is good to see more young people coming forward to help in our common cause. The training was alright, but I was surprised that the IRAS trainers made several mistakes in the training session which I thought it was not acceptable as such mistakes have a huge impact on a taxpayer’s compliance records. I hope that the coming VES will not be plagued by problems like last year.

Dinner With The PM

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I had not been expected to be invited to the Istana Garden Party on 26 Feb 2013, by the Prime Minister & The Cabinet. When the email invitation first came in early Jan, I thought it is for the appreciation for my Grassroots work in my constituency, but after checking with my constituency manager, she said that she did not nominate me for the dinner. That was when I suspected that it was for my IRAS Volunteer E-filing service. I did not want to go at first but at my mum’s urging, I decided to go for my 1st Istana dinner. I specially took leave to attend the dinner as I know it would be rushing for me to get to the Istana from my work place, even though it is 2 MRT stations away. I was a little apprehensive about the dinner as I knew I would be alone. The fortunate thing was that by virtue that I am a Grassroots Leader, I managed to ask my fellow grassroots leader friend, Fanny to reserve a seat for me. At least sitting with people that I know makes the dinner more comfortable.

Disappointment

It is just the 1st quarter of the year, but I am very disappointed with a friend of mine, whom I am not naming, as I am just keeping this friend as a hi & bye friend after she returns the money that she owes me. To think that my mum had asked me to go steady with her after meeting her a few times and thought that she was the one for me at first. It is fortunate that I did not pursue her further as I really could not tolerate her bad habits. This was what she did, to my fellow IRAS volunteer friend, A after they were paired together for the IRAS Volunteer e-filing exercise at the same CC for the last two years. I was surprised that A, who is a very active volunteer & very keen on taxation after taking up the VES with us, was hesitating when the VES was open for registration in late Jan. I have tried to persuade her to sign up early, but to no avail. It was until last Saturday, that she decided to sign up. By then, it was already quite full, so she had to settle for another CC