In the event of something unexpected such as the recent fire at Central World in Bangkok or the Phuket Tsunami of a few years ago, accounting and tax accounting documents are likely to be lost or damaged.

Therefore, it is imperative to know what to do in these situations and how to submit your income tax.

The first thing you have to do is go to the police station to inform them of what accounting documents have been lost or destroyed. You will be issued with a receipt that you can use at a later date as evidence of your loss when dealing with the Revenue Department and The Ministry of Commerce.

The internal procedures that the Revenue Department will be required to make are as follows:

(1) They will calculate the difference of the beginning and ending of your net assets, if the result is positive it indicates that tax must be paid on the profit or
(2) Estimate the business result of the year from the average result of 3-5 years back or
(3) Find the average ratio of the net profit margin of previous years. Then use this ratio with the annual sales that you have filed to calculate value-added tax during that year or
(4) Cross check the sales and purchase transactions with your customers or suppliers and calculate the profit from those transactions or
(5) Use powers under Section 71 (a) of the Revenue Code to assess the income tax rate by 5% of net income before any expenses.
During the 2000 floods in Had Yai, businesses in that area were granted a certain level of flexibility in the deduction of expenses, such as:
a) Being allowed to sell their damaged goods at below the market price
b) Being allowed to deduct the cost of repair, renovation and improvement as an expense.

Sirirat C. is the Managing Director of NAT, the ISO 9001:2008 certified accounting firm. Call 076 375 699
www.thaiaccounting.com