Businessman Loo Peng Wah, 50, and his wife Ng Lee Foon, 45, claimed trial after the charges were read separately to them in Cantonese before judge S Indra Nehru.
Loo was charged with seven counts of making false claims in the GST-03 statement, amounting to RM478,715 between October 2015 and April 2016, while his wife faced four similar charges, involving RM267,123, allegedly committed between January and May 2016.
They were alleged to have committed the offences at the Ipoh Station, Malaysian Royal Customs Department, No 1, Jalan Tun Abdul Razak, here.
The charge, under Section 89(1)(b) of the GST Act 2016, provides a fine of up to 20 times the amount of tax, or imprisonment for up to five years, or both, for the first offence, and a fine of up to 40 times the amount of tax, or up to seven years imprisonment, or both, for the second and subsequent offence, if found guilty.
The prosecution was conducted by Customs prosecuting officer S Thanaganatchya, while the couple was represented by lawyer Awtar Singh.
Indra Nehru allowed Loo bail of RM140,000 for all seven charges, while Ng’s bail was set at RM80,000 for all four charges in one surety each.
The couple was also ordered to surrender their passports to the court and to also report themselves to the nearest Customs office every month.
The court set Oct 4 for mention.