BIR Ruling

May 29, 1969 Mr. Buenaventura M. Borja Secretary to the Provincial Board Misamis Oriental S i r : This refers to your letter dated January 9, 1969 requesting reconsideration of the ruling of this Office dated September 24, 1968 denying your request for exemption from the payment of amusement taxes on the proceeds derived by the Agro-Industrial, Commercial, Carnival and Fair from the cockfights it sponsored at the Cagayan de Oro Coliseum on August 26, 27 and 28, 1968. It is alleged that the proceeds from the cockfights, sponsored by the fair would be used by the province to purchase an ambulance to service the Misamis Oriental Provincial Hospital which does not have ambulance at present; that the net share of the province that sponsored the cockfights in the amount of P2,715.40, is very insignificant; and that invoking the applicability of a previous ruling namely (BIR Ruling No. 385, S. of 1995) exempting from the payment of amusement taxes the admission fees and charges to swimming pools and dancing pavilions, of the Balara Filters on the basis that, profit is the primordial consideration in the determination of the taxability and non-taxability of an undertaking, and that inasmuch as the amounts realized by the Balara Filters is for the upkeep and maintenance of the place, the same is exempt from the aforesaid tax. In reply thereto, I regret to have to inform you that after careful reconsideration of your case, this Office finds no basis in fact or in law within which to reverse its former ruling. Your purpose is laudable, but it does not altogether militate against the imposition of the aforesaid tax since those do not constitute valid grounds on which an exemption from the payment of the amusement tax may rest. The ruling enunciated in the Balara Filters case is of a particular application, not general. It is not, therefore, to be applied as a matter of course. aisadc Very truly yours, (SGD.) MISAEL P. VERA Commissioner of Internal Revenue