THE INSURANCE COMPANIES MUST PAY

The insurance companies in The Bahamas are known to be the biggest rip-off artists in business in The Bahamas. Whether it is your life insurance, the property and car insurance, the health insurance when it comes to the insurance companies of The Bahamas, they like to collect your money but they don’t like to pay.  So now, since the implementation of VAT, insurance companies have not been paying the true VAT tax on their transactions for insurance in the health field.  What they have been doing is when a doctor charges a patient  VAT at his office and the insurance company pays the doctor’s bill, they then claim the VAT paid to the doctor back from the government as an input, which meant they were entitled to get a refund from the government.  This racket has been going on for years until someone in the tax office discovered that what they were doing is unlawful and not permitted. The government is owed some 60 million dollars in taxes back from the insurance companies.  But the insurance companies negotiated a sweetheart deal.  The government agreed not to go after the 60 million they owe but start collecting it from 1 April 2023.  The insurance companies agreed but then immediately went to the Opposition FNM to say it isn’t so and are now running a campaign in the public about the PLP hurting poor people.  What a web we weave when first we practice to deceive.  The  Government should not go after the 60 million they owe, if they don’t stop this campaign and apologise.