Bontang City Government Strengthens Digitalisation of Taxes and Levies to Curb Regional Revenue Leakage

The Bontang city government is continuing to push digitalisation in the management of regional taxes and levies. The move is intended to prevent leakage of locally generated revenue (PAD), while accelerating and improving the quality of services to the public.

Bontang Mayor Neni Moerniaeni said all revenue transactions are now directed to use digital systems so that they can be recorded directly in the regional treasury.

“With digitalisation, services become faster, more transparent, and certainly support clean governance. All regional treasury revenue transactions are recorded directly by the system, so there is no room for leakage,” Neni said on Wednesday (26/8).

Digitalisation is being applied in a number of sectors, including restaurant taxes, parking levies, and land and building tax (PBB). The Bontang city government has also prepared a special dashboard that allows the public to monitor and make payments online.

To improve taxpayer compliance, the Bontang city government is also running the Gebyar Pajak programme. Through this programme, compliant taxpayers have the opportunity to receive prizes. Meanwhile, for residents with arrears, discount and amnesty programmes are available.

Although the payment and recording system has been carried out digitally, Neni acknowledged that challenges remain in improving public compliance. Two sectors considered to have the lowest compliance rates are roadside parking levies and land and building tax.

“There is no leakage from the regional treasury deposit system because it is already digital. However, the main challenge lies in public compliance, which is still low. This tax-compliant mindset is what we continue to promote,” she explained.

In addition to improving digitalisation, the Bontang city government will also improve levy governance at a number of public facilities, including Bontang Regional General Hospital.

Meanwhile, the regional government continues to encourage the acceleration of the use of the Indonesia Credit Card (KKI) for transactions across all regional apparatus organisations (OPD). The move is expected to make all government spending transactions digitally recorded and further strengthen transparency in regional financial management.