The Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) on Monday clarified the assigned roles of the newly recruited Revenue Service Assistants (RSAs).
KRA made the statement after many Kenyans started speculating on the roles of the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) trained RSAs.
The Authority revealed that the scope of the RSAs would be providing support to taxpayers with their compliance needs.
One of the key roles of the revenue assistants will be to facilitate the online registration of trading businesses.
The RSAs will further be tasked with verifying taxpayer details as well as supporting compliance with the Tax Invoice Management System (TIMS) and its regulations.
Additionally, the RSAs will offer support geared towards compliance with excise regulations.
Being employees of the Authority, it will also be within their scope to collect tax-related data as deemed necessary.
"The RSAS will provide on-site facilitation to taxpayers, which will involve physical visits to taxpayer premises within the country,” KRA noted in a statement.
To increase transparency and eliminate impersonation, RSA will have KRA staff identification at all times and will be in uniform for ease of identification.
“The public can authenticate the staff details through USSD 572#, or use KRA Thibitisha which is available on the KRA website: www.kra.go.ke or through the KRA Mservice App,” the Authority stated.
Kenyans were encouraged to interact with the RSAs as their deployment was meant to assist the public.
The 1,405 RSAs graduated in August after completing a two-month training organised by KRA in partnership with KDF.
"The new skills and knowledge they acquired during this intensive 2-month period will empower them to execute their mandate with unparalleled proficiency and dedication," KRA stated then.
