KRA’s chief manager at the tax unit, George Obell. [Photo/Linkdin]The Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) has doubled staff at its international tax office. This decision comes in to place to help fast-track audits on multinationals it suspects of improper transfer pricing.KRA has beefed up employees at the unit to 40, up from 16 previously. The taxman is focusing lens on foreign firms that continue to report low profits or losses despite smaller players operating in the same sectors doing well, pointing to possible cases of manipulation in order evade tax.On Wednesday KRA’s chief manager at the tax unit, George Obell said, "Why would you have a company making losses through and through and you don't consider closing down?"The practice, which has been blamed for loss of revenues amounting to billions of dollars in Africa, has also taken root in other developing markets where multinationals have a presence."We are also looking at fast-tracking the arbitration process for easier collections," said Mr Obell while speaking at KRA’s third annual tax summit in NairobiThe country should refresh its tax administration rules on transfer pricing to make them fair and detailed. "This approach of saying they (multinationals) are guilty without even having understood what they are doing is wrong. We need to study and understand whether they are doing that,” Mr Hira said.KRA’s chief manager Mr Obell said the KRA has clawed back about Sh25 billion in the last three financial years through June 2017 after audits on 65 international firms.

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