Primary-source grounded
Every supported claim resolves to the provision it rests on.
In development — not yet available
Audeska Ask Read the rule. See the source.
A Pakistani tax research assistant being designed to answer against the statute, reveal the provisions behind its reasoning, and state plainly when the referenced law does not contain the answer.
The interface shown here is illustrative, not a live product capture.
Does section 153 apply to a resident IT services payment?
Audeska Ask
Answer structure in development
Yes, potentially. If the payer is a prescribed person, section 153 requires deduction on a payment to a resident person for services. §153(1)(b)
The applicable rate sits in the First Schedule and cannot be selected until the service and taxpayer categories are confirmed. Pt III, Div III
01
Section 153(1)(b)Payment for services
Open
02
First Schedule · Division IIIRate classification
Open
Boundary disclosed
Taxpayer-specific certificates and subordinate instruments require a separate check.
Version-aware
The planned answer retains the statutory edition and effective date used.
Explicitly bounded
Missing authority is surfaced as a research task, not filled with a plausible answer.
Answer anatomy
A useful answer remains open to inspection
Illustrative. Audeska Ask is not yet available — this is the answer shape we are building toward, written by hand, not captured from a running system.
01
Name the rule
Start with the governing provision rather than an unsupported conclusion.
02
Expose the branch points
List the facts that change classification, treatment or rate.
03
Preserve the evidence
Keep the cited provisions and corpus edition with the research note.
Question
Our client, a private limited company, is paying a Pakistan-resident IT company for annual software support services. Does the client need to deduct income tax from the payment?
Audeska Ask
Yes, potentially. If your client falls within the definition of a “prescribed person,” section 153 requires tax to be deducted when making a payment, including an advance payment, to a resident person for rendering or providing services. §153(1)(b)
The deduction is made from the gross amount payable. The applicable rate is not stated directly in section 153; it is prescribed in Division III of Part III of the First Schedule. §153(1)
Before applying a rate, confirm:
- whether the payer is a prescribed person under section 153;
- whether the recipient and payment qualify as IT or IT-enabled services;
- whether a specific exemption, reduced-rate certificate or other statutory exception applies;
- the recipient’s relevant taxpayer status where the applicable Schedule distinguishes between taxpayer categories.
Not found in the referenced law
The current Audeska Ask corpus does not include Income Tax Rules, SROs or certificates issued for a particular taxpayer. Any exception or reduced treatment arising from those sources must be checked separately.
Sources
- §153(1)(b) — payment for rendering or providing services
- §153(4) — certificate permitting payment without deduction, where applicable
- First Schedule, Pt III, Div III — applicable deduction rates
Research aid for qualified professionals based on the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001. Not tax advice; verify the applicable rate, effective date and official source before relying on it.
01 · CLAIMWhat the answer asserts
A qualified conclusion, with the factual condition visible.
02 · PROVISIONWhere the rule lives
The exact section or Schedule location opens for inspection.
03 · EDITIONWhich law was used
The corpus version stays attached to the saved note.
The difference
Why it does not just say “4%”
The value is not that it answers everything. It is that it gives you the rule, shows its source, exposes the missing facts, and declines to invent the part it cannot support.
“Deduct 4% withholding tax.”
Fast, confident, and possibly wrong. The treatment can turn on the service category, taxpayer status, current Schedule text, a certificate, or an amendment. None of that is visible in the answer.
“Here is the rule—and what you still need to confirm.”
Names the governing provision, cites it, separates the factual branches and leaves a short, specific verification list instead of an unsupported number.
The Ask Corpus
An answer is only as reliable as what it reads
Audeska Ask will not answer from a model’s memory of Pakistani tax law. It is being designed around a specific, versioned body of statutory text whose boundaries are published and reviewable.
Official text
Ordinance, Schedules and mapped amendments
Structured
Sections, clauses and rate divisions preserved
Human reviewed
Rates, thresholds and schedules checked
Retrieved
Relevant authority selected for the question
Cited answer
Claim, source and corpus version together
- The Income Tax Ordinance, 2001, as consolidated
- Its Schedules, including the First Schedule rate divisions
- Finance Act amendments, mapped to the provisions they change
- Section-level structure, so a citation resolves to an exact provision
- Income Tax Rules
- SROs and other subordinate instruments
- Certificates or rulings issued to a particular taxpayer
- Case law and departmental practice
Where one of these would change the outcome, Ask will say the answer is not found in the referenced law rather than guess at it.
Versioned, and honest about its date
Every answer will be tied to the corpus version it was drawn from, and a question about an earlier tax year will be answered against the text as it stood then.
The consolidated Ordinance published by FBR is presently marked as amended up to 20 February 2026, while the Finance Act 2026 was issued afterwards, in June 2026. Those amendments must be incorporated and reviewed before the corpus can be described as current for the 2026–27 year.
Consolidated edition
Version-labelled to 20 February 2026
Amendment review
Finance Act 2026 mapped before release
Provisions, Schedules and rate tables extracted with their structure intact.
Every rate, threshold and Schedule checked by a person against the official source—not sampled.
A release suite of real practice questions, which it must pass with no fabricated citations.
The fair question
Why not just use ChatGPT?
You should not buy Audeska Ask instead of ChatGPT. ChatGPT is a broader general-purpose tool, and your firm may reasonably use both.
Audeska Ask is worth paying for only when the approved source, citations, version history and engagement record create a real operational advantage.
We will not claim our model is smarter than a general assistant. The argument is narrower than that, and it rests on five things.
A maintained professional source, not an open-ended conversation
A general assistant offers valuable breadth. Audeska Ask will be deliberately narrower: an identified statutory corpus, provision-level citations, and no rate or threshold filled from model memory.
Research attached to actual firm work
The planned workflow will preserve the corpus version and citations with an editable research note attached to the client engagement or task.
Standardisation across junior staff
Use the firm-approved corpus, show the governing provision, separate factual branches, save the conclusion against the engagement and make it reviewable.
Institutional memory
The durable asset is the accumulated body of firm-reviewed notes, recurring interpretations, provision histories and partner-approved internal guidance.
Fewer steps between question and filed evidence
If the embedded path is not materially faster and safer, there is no case for the add-on. That is the bar we have to clear.
General assistant9 steps
- Start a conversation
- Locate or upload the right law
- Explain the answer constraints
- Request citations
- Check the citations exist
- Verify version and effective date
- Copy the result elsewhere
- Associate it with the client matter
- Make sure the team can find it
Audeska Ask5 steps
- Ask from the engagement or task
- Receive a cited answer from the approved corpus
- Inspect the provision
- Save and attach the note
- Continue the engagement
| General AI assistant | Audeska Ask, as designed | |
|---|---|---|
| General intelligence | Far superior breadth | Deliberately narrow |
| Drafting and analysis | Excellent across domains | Tax-reference focused |
| Statutory corpus | You locate and validate the sources | Audeska-maintained and version-labelled |
| Citation discipline | Can be prompted; you verify | Enforced citation contract |
| Client and engagement context | Supplied or connected manually | Native to the engagement and task |
| Research retention | Chat and project history | Structured notes attached to engagements |
| Firm workflow | A separate workspace | Embedded in compliance execution |
| Breadth of value per subscription | Very high | High only for firms doing frequent tax work |
| Relationship | — | Complements a general assistant; does not replace it |
Our advice, for now
Until we can demonstrate that operational advantage in your own practice, stay on the included preview rather than buying an add-on. If it is only another chat window, it is not worth paying for.
Where it stands
The launch gates are part of the product
A research tool that is confidently wrong about a threshold is worse than no tool at all. Before Audeska Ask is available to any firm, it has to clear gates we set deliberately high:
Legally current corpus
A versioned Income Tax Ordinance with Finance Act amendments mapped to the provisions they change.
Complete human review
Every rate, threshold and Schedule in the corpus checked against the official source—not a sample.
Zero fabricated citations
An evaluation suite it has to pass before any firm sees the product.
Deterministic lookup
Known section references retrieved directly, without depending on model judgement.
Audeska Ask will be a research aid for qualified professionals. It will not constitute tax advice, and it will not replace professional judgement or review.
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Tell us the questions your practice actually loses time to. Early access goes to the firms helping us decide what it has to get right.
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