With the approval of parliament, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has established the National Faceless Centre (NFC) which will be operational by next month to eliminate interaction between tax officers and taxpayers. Pakistan's tax machinery heavily relies on this paradigm shift, with increasing optimism that this new operational model will help it achieve a highly ambitious tax collection target of Rs15.264 trillion for the current fiscal year.
For the first quarter (July-Sept) period of FY27, the FBR envisaged a tax collection target of Rs3,053 billion. The FBR will have to fetch Rs1,331 billion in September 2026 to materialize the desired target agreed with the IMF. According to the FBR's announcement on Friday, the Federal Board of Revenue has established the National Faceless Centre (NFC) in Islamabad.
The decision was taken by the Board in Council in its meeting held on Friday. The NFC is a major reform that changes how tax audits and assessments are carried out in Pakistan. Until now, a taxpayer whose return was picked for audit had to deal with a particular officer in a particular office, often in person.
Under the new system, that contact ends. Cases will be selected by a computerized, risk-based system rather than by any officer. Each case will then be assigned automatically to an officer who may be sitting anywhere in the country.
The taxpayer will not know who the officer is, and the officer will have no say in which case comes to him. Every case will pass through three hands. One officer will conduct the audit, a second will make the assessment, and a third will review the work for quality before any order is issued.
No single officer will control a taxpayer's case from start to finish. All notices, replies and hearings will take place electronically through the FBR's IRIS system. Where the law requires a physical verification or recovery, this will be carried out by a separate field team.
The NFC draws its legal authority from the Finance Act, 2026. It will be headed by a chief commissioner Inland Revenue, with dedicated wings for faceless audit, faceless assessment, quality control and field operations. A Programme Management Unit has already been set up to oversee its rollout.
The purpose of the reform is the same rules for every taxpayer, decisions based on data rather than personal judgement, and an end to the face-to-face contact that has long been a source of complaints. The FBR expects the NFC to make tax proceedings faster, fairer, and more transparent for taxpayers across Pakistan.