Car body trader gets jail for tax evasion, is fined more than S$800,000
The income tax undercharged across the two years exceeds S$260,000
[SINGAPORE] A 54-year-old businessman was sentenced on Monday (Dec 22) to more than a year in jail for income tax and goods and services tax (GST) offences involving undeclared income from his car body trading activities.
Rickey Tan was sentenced to 12 months and two weeks’ imprisonment, ordered to pay a tax penalty of S$806,861, and fined S$3,500, after being convicted of income tax evasion and failure to register for GST.
Court documents showed that Tan was engaged in the business of trading car bodies both in his personal capacity and through his company, Car Ranger.
However, income derived from his personal trading activities was not declared in his personal income tax filings for the years of assessment 2018 and 2019.
The filings were prepared and submitted by an accounting firm on Tan’s behalf, but he failed to inform the firm of the additional income he had earned personally. This resulted in false entries being made in his tax returns for both years.
For the year of assessment 2018, Tan declared income of S$195,000, despite having actually earned S$904,628, omitting more than S$709,000. In 2019, he again declared S$195,000, while his actual income was S$708,426, omitting over S$513,000.
The income tax undercharged across the two years exceeded S$260,000.
Court documents noted that Tan was aware of his obligation to accurately report his income, but chose not to do so as he did not want to pay a higher amount of tax.
Separately, Tan was also convicted of a GST offence after failing to register for GST despite his taxable supplies exceeding S$1 million.
Records show that by June 2013, his business had crossed the registration threshold, but he did not notify the tax authorities within the required timeframe, resulting in unpaid GST of about S$245,421.
Checks by The Business Times show that Car Ranger, incorporated in 2010, has since been struck off, meaning the company has been removed from the official register and is no longer legally permitted to operate.
On Facebook, the company’s profile described its business as dealing in “scrap and export vehicles”.
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