Telcos must pay tax on mobile money transactions – Ursula Owusu-Ekuful

The Minister-Designate for Communication and Digitalisation, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has entreated the government to start taxing telecom operators on the huge sums of revenue they make mobile money transactions.

Making her submissions to the appointments committee, the Communication Minister-Designate disclosed that telcos needed to be taxed for the 10 percent charges they place on mobile money transactions.

“In my opinion, the transaction fees generated by operators from this huge traffic and volumes on mobile money platforms ought to be taxed.

“I am not saying that individuals who send and receive mobile money should be taxed however the fees they pay to all network operators for the service is revenue that they earn and the State has to be interested in that and has to tax them for it,” she said.

According to Madam Owusu-Ekuful, the country has not yet taken advantage of technology revenue streams since it continues to evolve.

She also disclosed to the committee that telcos have also resorted to making customers buy airtime credits via mobile money to evade taxes on scratch cards hence when given the nod she will ensure that mobile network operators pay revenue in that effect.

She said, “The revenue that the state would have gotten from the sale and receipt of scratch cards is lost to the state. They are charging 10 percent for each top-up on mobile money which is money they are generating, which is currently beyond the reach of the State.”



“So while we are losing money on the traditional revenue streams because of the evolution of technology, we have disabled the state from gaining the revenue from the new stream that these network operators are getting,” she explained.

Madam Owusu-Ekuful also noted the state has not put any tax inducement on “mobile money and all revenue generated from it [mobile money] are not taxed as financial transactions.”