Withholding Tax Card 2026-27 Pakistan: The Rates That Actually Come Out of Your Money

Search "tax card 2026-27" and you'll get a PDF from a Big 4 accounting firm thirty pages of section numbers written for people who already know what a section number is. Useful, if you're an accountant. Less so if you just noticed Rs 400 missing from your bank profit and want to know why.

The short answer: A withholding tax card lists the rates at which tax is deducted from you at source before the money reaches you. In Pakistan for 2026-27, the ones an ordinary salaried person actually meets are salary tax under Section 149, tax on bank profit and dividends, advance tax on large cash withdrawals for non-filers, and 15% on phone and internet bills. Being on the Active Taxpayers List roughly halves most of them.

This page is general information, not tax advice. It covers the common items only — not property, vehicles, imports, or business payments. For the complete official card, see FBR, and confirm your own position with a tax professional.

Key takeaways

• Withholding tax is not a separate tax. It's your income tax, collected early — and it's adjustable against what you eventually owe.
• Under the Finance Act 2026, most non-filer rates are simply double the filer rate (PwC Tax Summaries — Pakistan, retrieved 2026-08-23).
• Salary tax starts at zero below Rs 600,000 a year and rises through eight bands to 35%.
• Cash withdrawal costs filers nothing. Non-filers pay 0.8% above Rs 50,000 in a day.
• Phone and internet bills are 15% for everyone, filer or not — one of the few rates that doesn't reward filing.
• On bank profit, the published sources genuinely disagree. We've said so below rather than pick one.

What is a withholding tax card?

A withholding tax card is a one-page summary of every rate at which tax is deducted from you before you receive the money. Your employer does it with your salary. Your bank does it with your profit. Your mobile operator does it with your top-up. The card is simply the list of those rates, published each year after the budget.

Here's the part that catches people out: withholding tax isn't an extra tax. It's the same income tax you'd owe anyway, collected in advance by whoever is paying you. When you file your return, the amounts already withheld are credited against your total bill. Sometimes that leaves you owing more. Sometimes it means you're owed a refund.

"Most Pakistanis have never paid a tax bill. They've only ever had tax taken — from a salary, a bank profit, a phone top-up — before the money was ever theirs to hold."

Which is exactly why so few people know these rates. You don't hand the money over, so you never see the transaction.

The 2026-27 rates most people actually meet

Rates below are for Tax Year 2027, the year running from 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027. "Filer" means your name appears on FBR's Active Taxpayers List (ATL) — see how to check your filer status if you're not sure.

Compiled 2026-08-23 from PwC Tax Summaries — Pakistan and two independent Pakistani rate-card publishers, cross-checked row by row. Not an FBR publication — confirm against FBR before relying on any figure.

Two words in that table do a lot of work. "Final" means the deduction settles that income completely — you don't add it to your salary and pay again. "Advance" means it's a down payment: it counts toward your annual bill, and if too much was taken you can claim it back when you file.

Where the published sources disagree — and why we're not hiding it

On profit from bank deposits, we could not get the sources to agree, so we're not publishing a single number.

PwC's Pakistan tax summary, reviewed in January 2026, puts the rate for people on the ATL at 20% on profit from a banking company or financial institution. Several Pakistani rate-card publishers list 15% for 2026-27. Both are widely republished. They cannot both be right, and the difference on Rs 200,000 of bank profit is Rs 10,000.

What every source does agree on: the non-filer rate is double the filer rate, whatever the filer rate turns out to be. So the shape of the decision is unambiguous even where the number isn't.

What we'd do: ask your bank for the exact rate they're deducting — it's on your profit advice and they'll confirm it in writing — or check the current rate card on FBR directly. Don't budget off a number you found on a blog, including this one.

That's an unsatisfying answer. It's also the honest one, and we'd rather give you an honest gap than a confident guess on a number you might plan around.

Why does being a filer cut most of these rates in half?

Because the higher non-filer rates aren't really about revenue — they're a nudge. The Tenth Schedule of the Income Tax Ordinance sets increased rates for people not on the ATL, and under the Finance Act 2026 most of those increases are a straight doubling.

Work through what that means on ordinary money:

None of those are enormous individually. Together, over a year, for someone who saves and withdraws normally, they add up to real money — for a filing process that costs nothing but an afternoon. Our filer vs non-filer guide walks through the full difference, and registering on IRIS covers getting on the list in the first place.

What about the 75% rate on phone bills?

It probably doesn't apply to you. Several rate cards list 75% as the non-filer rate on telephone and internet bills, which understandably alarms people who aren't on the ATL.

The reading that fits the sources we could check: Section 236 charges 15% to everyone, and the higher rate is reserved for people FBR has specifically named in a published list of non-filers — a narrow enforcement measure, not the default for anyone unregistered.

Either way, the 15% you pay on every top-up is advance tax. It's adjustable. If you file a return and your total liability is lower than what's been withheld across the year, that difference is claimable. Most people never claim it, which is a quiet reason filing is worth more than it looks.

How much of this have you already paid this year?

Try the arithmetic on yourself. A rough month for someone earning Rs 150,000:

• Salary tax: Rs 6,000/month, deducted by the employer (slab table)
• Phone and internet: Rs 5,000 of bills → Rs 750 at 15%
• Bank profit on Rs 300,000 sitting in a savings account → withheld at source before it's credited

That's over Rs 80,000 a year in tax that never passed through your hands. You didn't write a cheque for any of it.

The first time I actually read a profit advice from my bank properly, I realised I'd been quietly mis-reading my savings for years. The number I thought I was earning was the number before tax — and once you take the deduction off, and then take Pakistani inflation off what's left, the account I'd thought of as "safe" was going backwards. That's not an argument against saving. It's an argument for knowing your real number, which is what how inflation shrinks your savings is about.

What this card doesn't cover

Deliberately: property transactions (Sections 236C and 236K), motor vehicles, imports, contracts, and business payments. Those rates are slabbed, they change more often, and getting them slightly wrong on a property deal costs real money. The full official card lives with FBR; for anything with a lakh at stake, use a tax professional rather than a blog.

We'd rather cover six things accurately than thirty things approximately.

Frequently asked questions

What is a withholding tax card in Pakistan?
It's a one-page summary of the rates at which tax is deducted from you at source — from salary, bank profit, dividends, cash withdrawals, and phone bills — for a given tax year. The rates are set each year by the Finance Act and published by FBR.

Do filers pay less withholding tax in Pakistan?
Yes, on most items. Under the Finance Act 2026, non-filer rates are generally double the filer rate. Cash withdrawal is the starkest example: filers pay nothing, non-filers pay 0.8% above Rs 50,000 in a day.

How much tax is deducted on cash withdrawal in Pakistan?
Nothing for people on the Active Taxpayers List. Non-filers pay 0.8% advance tax on cash withdrawals exceeding Rs 50,000 in a single day, under Section 231AB. It's adjustable against your annual tax when you file.

What is the tax on dividends in Pakistan for 2026-27?
15% for filers and 30% for non-filers on general dividends and equity mutual funds, as a final tax. Dividends from debt-based mutual funds are taxed higher — 25% for filers and 50% for non-filers.

Is withholding tax refundable?
Advance withholding like the tax on phone bills or cash withdrawals is adjustable against your annual liability, and refundable if too much was taken. Final tax, such as on dividends, is not. You claim either through your return, so see our filing guide.

About Pebble

Pebble is building a simpler first step into investing for Pakistanis, starting with real, physically-backed gold you own from as little as 0.1 gram. We're pre-launch and we write about money the way we wish someone had explained it to us.

Sources

• Federal Board of Revenue (FBR). Withholding tax rate card and Income Tax Ordinance 2001. Retrieved 2026-08-23, from https://www.fbr.gov.pk/
• PwC. "Pakistan — Individual: Income determination." Worldwide Tax Summaries. Retrieved 2026-08-23, from https://taxsummaries.pwc.com/pakistan/individual/income-determination
• Salary slab figures reused from Pebble's own Income Tax Slabs 2026-27, verified 2026-08-13 against FBR Budget 2026-27 Salient Features, the PwC Tax Memorandum on Finance Bill 2026, and Mercans' Finance Act 2026-27 alert.
• Non-salary withholding rates cross-checked 2026-08-23 against two independent Pakistani rate-card publishers; rows where they conflicted with PwC are marked as contested in the text rather than resolved.