How to get a tax clearance certificate in Nigeria

A tax clearance certificate (TCC) is a one page document from the tax authority saying you have settled your taxes for the three years of assessment immediately before the year you are applying. If your business is a registered limited company, you apply to FIRS through TaxPro-Max. If you are a sole trader, an enterprise, a partner or an individual, you apply to the internal revenue service of the state where you live, for example the Lagos State Internal Revenue Service (LIRS) through its eTax portal.

The single thing that decides how fast you get it: your returns for those three years must already be filed and any tax due paid. The paperwork is quick. Cleaning up unfiled years is what takes weeks.

Who issues your TCC, FIRS or the state

Pick the wrong office and you will queue for nothing. The test is what kind of taxpayer you are, not what kind of contract you are bidding for.

A common trap: a man runs "XYZ Global Ventures", a registered business name, and goes to FIRS for a TCC because the contract came from a federal agency. FIRS will send him to his state IRS, because an enterprise is not a company. The issuing office follows the taxpayer, not the counterparty.

The documents FIRS or the state IRS will ask for

The list below is the standard one. Individual states add or drop an item, so treat it as the pack to walk in with rather than the last word.

If you do not know your Tax ID or have lost it, check it first with the free Tax ID lookup before you start, because an application under the wrong or duplicated TIN is the most common reason a file goes back to the bottom of the pile.

For a company, the audited accounts are the item that holds people up. If your auditor has not signed off the third year, nothing else in the pack moves.

Where you actually submit it

For companies: log in at TaxPro-Max, confirm all returns for the three years are showing as filed with payment receipts attached, then apply for the TCC under the taxpayer services menu. FIRS prints and stamps it at the tax office where your file sits, so you will still visit or send a representative with an authority letter.

For individuals and sole traders in Lagos: LIRS issues an electronic TCC through eTax. You apply, the office assesses any shortfall, you pay through the platform, and the e-TCC is generated with a serial number a third party can verify. Other states run the same model under different names through their own IRS portals, and a few still work on paper at the tax station covering your area.

If your returns for those three years are not yet in, that is step zero. You can start a return for the outstanding years and then apply, rather than applying first and waiting for a rejection.

How the tax itself is worked out, with real numbers

This is the part a TCC application exposes. Here is a full case.

Chidinma, a sole trader bidding for a supply contract

Chidinma runs a registered business name supplying office equipment in Ibadan. For 2026 she has:

• Business profit: ₦6,000,000
• Consultancy income on the side: ₦1,500,000
• Annual rent on her flat: ₦1,200,000

Both income streams are hers personally, so they are added together. There is no Consolidated Relief Allowance any more, it has been repealed. The relief she can claim is rent relief: 20% of ₦1,200,000 is ₦240,000, which is under the ₦500,000 cap, so she claims the full ₦240,000.

Total income: ₦6,000,000 + ₦1,500,000 = ₦7,500,000 Less rent relief: ₦7,500,000 − ₦240,000 = ₦7,260,000 taxable income

Now the 2026 bands:

Chidinma's tax for the year is ₦1,096,800. Her TCC will show that figure against 2026, along with the equivalent figures for the two years before it. If she has already paid ₦1,096,800, the certificate is a formality. If she has paid nothing, she pays it before the certificate is signed. You can run your own version of this in the free tax calculator before you walk into the tax office, so the assessment does not surprise you.

The same business as a limited company

Say Chidinma had incorporated instead, with turnover of ₦80,000,000 and fixed assets of ₦40,000,000. Both are under the small company limits (turnover of ₦100,000,000 or less and fixed assets of ₦250,000,000 or less), so the company pays no company income tax and no development levy. It must still file its returns.

Her TCC would then show nil tax for those years, and that is a perfectly valid TCC. Procurement officers accept it. What they will not accept is a company that never filed, because with no return there is nothing for FIRS to certify.

Now take a bigger company: turnover ₦150,000,000, assessable profit ₦20,000,000. It is over the small company turnover limit, so:

• Company income tax: 30% of ₦20,000,000 = ₦6,000,000
• Development levy: 4% of ₦20,000,000 = ₦800,000
• Total to clear before the TCC: ₦6,800,000

If that company is also VAT registered, FIRS will look at its VAT filings too. VAT is 7.5% of the value of taxable supplies, due by the 21st of the month following the transactions. A gap in VAT filings will stall a TCC even when the company income tax is fully paid.

How long it takes

Two to three weeks is the realistic window when your returns and payments are already in order, and the law backs that. Under section 101 of the Personal Income Tax Act, the tax authority must either issue the TCC or give written reasons for refusing it within two weeks of a proper application. The company side has the same duty. Where a state IRS runs a fully electronic process, a clean file can produce an e-TCC in a few working days.

What stretches it out:

• Unfiled years. Each year has to be assessed before it can be cleared. Three missing years is realistically a month or more of back and forth.
• Audited accounts not ready. For companies, this is the usual bottleneck.
• A tax audit or query on your file. The office will not certify a year that is under review.
• Payment not reflecting. Pay through the portal and keep the electronic receipt, not just the bank teller.

If you know a contract award or loan decision is coming, start six weeks out, not six days out.

File first, then apply, because deadlines drive the whole thing

A TCC is only a summary of returns you have already filed. These are the dates that keep your file clean:

Miss any of these and you owe not just the tax but a late filing penalty and interest set by the tax authority's schedule. The exact naira amounts vary by tax type and by whether it is a first or repeat default, and they are not figures I will quote from memory here. Ask your FIRS tax office or state IRS for the penalty computation on your specific file before you pay, so you clear the whole balance at once instead of applying twice. The free eight part course walks through the filing calendar in more detail if you are setting up your records from scratch.

What usually gets a TCC application rejected

• Applying to the wrong authority. An enterprise going to FIRS, or a company going to the state IRS for its own TCC.
• One year missing out of three. Certification is for three consecutive years. Two out of three is a refusal, not a partial pass.
• Duplicate TINs. If your business name and your personal Tax ID got mixed up at registration, payments land in the wrong file and appear as arrears.
• Address mismatch. State IRS jurisdiction follows where you reside. If your ID says Lagos and your utility bill says Ogun, resolve it before applying.
• Staff PAYE not remitted. A company can be current on its own company income tax and still be blocked because it deducted PAYE from staff and never remitted it.

Questions you will ask next

How long is a TCC valid for? It certifies the three years named on its face and tax offices treat it as current for the year in which it was issued. Once a new year of assessment opens, expect to be asked for a fresh one. Contracting agencies and banks almost always want a certificate issued in the current year.

My business is only one year old. Can I still get a TCC? Yes. The certificate covers the years since your incorporation or registration date, and the CAC certificate proves why the earlier years are blank. This is normal and is not a red flag to procurement officers.

I am a salary earner and my employer deducts PAYE. Do I apply myself? You apply to your state IRS, but you need your employer to supply the remittance schedules and receipts showing your name and the amounts deducted. If your employer deducted and did not remit, your TCC stalls even though you personally did nothing wrong. Ask your HR or accounts department for the evidence before you file the application.

Does it cost money? The certificate itself is not sold. What you pay is the outstanding tax, plus any penalty or interest on late years. If anyone quotes you a "processing fee" for the paper, that is not a statutory charge.

My company made no profit. Can I get a TCC? Yes. A nil assessment is still an assessment. File the return, get the assessment notice, apply for the certificate. Small companies within the turnover and fixed asset limits are exempt from company income tax and the development levy but are still required to file, and it is that filing that makes the TCC possible.

Can someone collect it for me? Yes, with a signed authority letter on your letterhead, a copy of your ID and their own ID. Where the state issues an e-TCC, it lands in your portal account and you print it yourself.

How does the bank or agency confirm it is genuine? Every TCC carries a serial number and the issuing office. FIRS and state services verify on request, and electronic certificates can be checked against the issuing portal. Do not buy a certificate from a "facilitator". A fake TCC presented to a government agency is a criminal matter, and the verification step is exactly where it fails.

Your order of operations

1. Confirm your Tax ID and that it is the only one attached to you or your business, using the Tax ID lookup.
2. Check which three years the certificate must cover, and confirm each one has a filed return.
3. File any missing year now, before you apply, at start a return.
4. Pay the assessed tax and any penalty through the portal, and save the electronic receipt.
5. Assemble the document pack from the table above.
6. Apply on TaxPro-Max (companies) or your state IRS portal such as LIRS eTax (individuals and sole traders).
7. Follow up after two weeks, in writing, quoting the two week rule, if you have heard nothing.

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