Authorised Revenue officers are empowered to make an application to a judge of the High Court seeking an order requiring financial institutions to supply names, addresses and other relevant information concerning account holders who may have held bogus non-resident deposit accounts. Such applications are made under section 908 of the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997, as amended by the Finance Act 1999. I am advised by the Revenue Commissioners that information supplied by the financial institutions under section 908 orders is the principal basis for identifying bogus non-resident account holders who did not avail of the voluntary disclosure scheme in 2001. This inquiry work commenced on 16 November 2001.
I am advised by the Revenue Commissioners that 18 applications for orders under section 908 have been made and have been granted. When one includes institutions which have been taken over or amalgamated with other institutions, these orders seek information in respect of accounts in 26 financial institutions. No further applications for such orders are pending in regard to the bogus non-resident account inquiries.
A large volume of information has been reported to Revenue under the High Court orders and inquiry work in relation to the examination of the first batch of taxpayers commenced on 11 October 2002. Further general issues of inquiry letters were made in January, May, July, September and October 2003. These general inquiry letter issues relate to 76,000 non-resident accounts that had Irish addresses connected to them. To date 149,000 inquiry letters have been issued to taxpayers in respect of these non-resident accounts. The final general inquiry letter issue is scheduled to take place in January 2004.
