MIRA will only accept digital payments to certain set amount of money

Just recently, Maldives Customs Service announced their decision to stop accepting physical payments completely from starting 1^st October 2020. Following this path, local tax authority, Maldives Inland Revenue Authority (MIRA) has also announced their resolution to only accept digital payments for stipulated amount of money, set by them.

Both, Maldives Customs Service and MIRA have highlighted that a significant reason behind taking this step is as Ministry of Finance has appealed to organization to introduce digital modes of payment. The initiative by the Ministry is to normalize using digital means throughout the nation for the purpose of lessening the dependency of the country’s economy on hard cash and cheques.

Photo: MIRA

Starting from 1^st October 2020, MIRA will only be accepting digital payments for amounts higher than MVR 100,000 or USD 5,000. Digital payments for MIRA can be transacted through MIRAconnect, VaaruPay, through credit/debit card and MRTGCS; digital means existing however not made the best use out of. Nonetheless, payments lesser than the stipulated amounts can still be made through digital options.

Digital payments are more secure as they can be tracked which increase transparency and security of payments resulting decreasing the risk of corruption and theft.

The decision by MIRA might not decrease the full crowd of people queuing up at MIRA to submit their payments, however, it does decrease the number of people by a margin which is an amazing step during this time of the COVID-19 outbreak.