Nigeria’s taxman wants to view your VAT payments in real-time
Here’s what’s happened: The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigeria’s tax agency, has rolled out
a real-time portal that forces card networks, banks, fintechs, and payment service providers to upload every VAT-eligible transaction to its dashboard.
The new transaction monitoring system is the taxman’s most aggressive step yet at closing tax gaps in the country’s booming digital economy.
How it works:
Institutions will connect to the portal through APIs, transmitting each VAT-eligible payment to FIRS before it is completed. These financial institutions must send each payment’s gross value, VAT amount, and merchant info to the portal.
If VAT wasn’t collected upfront, providers must calculate it on the transaction value and deduct it. The portal then groups and logs entries, giving FIRS live visibility on what’s taxable, and enabling the tax body to reconcile invoices, monitor compliance, and standardise records across millions of microtransactions.
Here’s why it matters: Before now, FIRS was unable to monitor the taxes deducted on VAT-eligible transactions—what the agency describes as the single biggest leakage point for consumption taxes. By deploying this technology, the agency plugs a hole in this leak.
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What will this mean? Users will see stricter VAT deductions on even the smallest online payments. Platforms and fintechs face tighter scrutiny, higher compliance costs, and daily penalties for delays, while the government gains stronger oversight and less tolerance for unreported or ‘grey area’ transactions.
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This rollout is a decisive shift in Nigeria’s tax enforcement. Whether it builds trust or fuels resistance will depend on how seamlessly the system runs and how openly FIRS addresses public concerns.
