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CBIC extends due date of GST compliance of E-Way Bill in respect of goods sent/taken on approval for Sale/Return are removed before the Supply takes place

September 22, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

The Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) extended the due date of GST compliance and validity of the e-way bill till October 31, 2020 in respect of goods sent/taken on approval for sale/return are removed before the supply takes place.

The Board seeks to amend notification of the Government of India in the Ministry of Finance (Department of Revenue), No. 35/2020-Central Tax, dated the 3rd April, 2020.

The board seeks to amend clause (i) of the said notification to extend the due date of compliance which falls during the period from the 20th day of March, 2020 to the 29th day of June, to 30th day of June, 2020.

In the said notification, in the first paragraph, in clause (i), after the first proviso, “provided further that where, any time limit for completion or compliance of any action, by any person, has been specified in, or prescribed or notified under sub-section (7) of section 31 of the said Act in respect of goods being sent or taken out of India on approval for sale or return, which falls during the period from the 20th day of March, 2020 to the 30th day of October, 2020, and where completion or compliance of such action has not been made within such time, then, the time limit for completion or compliance of such action, shall stand extended up to the 31st day of October, 2020,” shall be inserted.

The Section 31(7) of the Union Territory Goods and Service Tax Act says, “where the goods being sent or taken on approval for sale or return are removed before the supply takes place, the invoice shall be issued before or at the time of supply or six months from the date of removal, whichever is earlier.”

Source: TaxScan.

Government rolls out facility of filing of Nil GST return through SMS

June 8, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

In a bid to make compliance easier for taxpayers, the Government on Monday allowed filing of Nil GST monthly return in FORM GSTR-3B through SMS.

This would substantially improve ease of GST compliance for over 22 lakh registered taxpayers who had to otherwise log into their account on the common portal and then file their returns every month.

Now, these taxpayers with NIL liability need not log on to the GST Portal and may file their NIL returns through a SMS. According to a statement, the functionality of filing Nil FORM GSTR-3B through SMS has been made available on the GSTN portal with immediate effect.

The status of the returns so filed can be tracked on the GST Portal by logging in to GSTIN account and navigating to Services>Returns>Track Return Status. The procedure to file Nil returns by SMS is as follows: –

“This is a good move by the Government to ease the compliance burden for taxpayers with nil liability. India ranks a lowly 115 out of around 190 countries in ease of paying taxes, and such initiatives are definitely needed to make the compliances easy, less time consuming and in line with global best practices,” said Harpreet Singh, Partner, KPMG India.

Similarly, MS Mani, Partner, Deloitte India says, “Filing Nil returns through an SMS would significantly help smaller businesses as they can now focus on businesses revival.”

Source: Economic-Times.

GST portal glitches to dominate agenda of Council meeting on Saturday

March 10, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

Glitches on the goods and services tax (GST) portal will dominate the agenda of the Council meeting on Saturday, even as states will vehemently seek resolution of delayed compensation issue. Infosys Chairman Nandan Nilekani has been asked to make a presentation before the Council.

“Hassles on the GST portal even 30 months after roll-out is unacceptable and that has been communicated to both GST Network and Infosys,” said a government official.

States are likely to demand that Infosys should have a point of contact in each state to resolve these glitches, the official said.

Meanwhile, the electronic invoice facility is likely to be deferred by three months from April 1 to July owing to lack of readiness of both GSTN and the taxpayers.

Finance Secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey took a detailed meeting with Infosys officials on March 7 on the GSTN-related matters, more importantly ahead of the crucial roll-out of new simplified returns from April 1. GSTN’s tech support partner Infosys has been asked to come up with a plan for quick resolution within a fortnight.

System capacity constraints and the inability of GST Network to provide smooth return filing will be taken up at the Council.

With new returns format to be rolled out from April, it was imperative for GSTN and Infosys to work effectively, he added. The department of revenue, in a letter to Infosys on March 5, highlighted that the issues flagged in 2018 were still unresolved and that failures month after month resulted in genuine taxpayers getting frustrated.

“It is requested to go through the pending issues, day-to-day disruptions and the future road map and come up with a plan for quick resolution within 15 days. Infosys has set high international standards and it is expected that the efficiency which your organisation is known for should be visible in GST project also,” the letter said.

It also said even though the GST system has been in operation for the last 30 months, there have been instances of taxpayer complaints on facing issues in filing returns in the last two days of filing of returns.

“It is noticed that MSP (Master Service Provider) Infosys has been repeatedly asked to take timely action and to identify the root cause of issues after each event and taken corrective action. However, problem still persists,” it said.

The ministry said such glitches on the portal led to an unhealthy tax compliance requirement, more so when on account of such disruptions some taxpayers end up becoming liable for payment of late fee, interest.

The ministry is working to shore up GST revenues. In the April-February period this fiscal year, GST collection stood at Rs 11.24 trillion, down from Rs 12.67 trillion in the year-ago period.

No response at peak hours, wrong computation of late fees for annual returns for FY18, and offline tool not available for GSTR9 are among a list of problems flagged in the letter.

Compensation cess issue will be raised by the states, who are likely to ask for full compensation for the fiscal year, irrespective of collections and pitch for extension of compensation period. The Centre, meanwhile, is expected to clearly tell states that they will be compensated only as much as is collected in the cess fund, according to the law.

With only 56 per cent of compensation dues for October and November worth Rs 19.958 crore disbursed last month, states are expected to strongly seek a resolution on the matter.

The Centre is supposed to compensate states on a bi-monthly basis for any losses they incur in the first five years of GST implementation. The loss is estimated if they do not record 14 per cent increase in the subsumed indirect taxes keeping 2014-15 as the base year.

The Centre has released a total of Rs 120,498 crore as GST compensation to the states and Union Territories so far in FY20 out of Rs 87,821 crore collected till February.

Source: Business-Standard.

Non-compliance in GST payments may be burning a Rs 5 tn hole in revenues

January 21, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

The government may be losing Rs 5 trillion in indirect tax revenue a year, amounting to 40% of its goods and services tax (GST) collection target, because of defaults and evasion, according to the Fifteenth Finance Commission’s (FFC), confirming policymakers’ fears that businesses are not paying their fair share of taxes.

In a recent presentation made to the GST Council, FFC has assessed that the revenue loss was equivalent to 2.4% of gross domestic product. This works out to Rs 5 trillion if one goes by the first advance estimate of nominal GDP for FY20 released earlier this month. This is as much as 40% of the GST revenue centre and states together may collect this year, going by the trend of an average Rs 1 trillion a month GST revenue in the first nine months of the current fiscal.
In the nine months to 31 December, central and state governments have collected more than Rs 9 trillion in GST and hope to collect an additional Rs 3.55 trillion by end of March.

FFC’s estimate of revenue loss from non-compliance is giving a strong backing to the tax administration’s bid to tighten enforcement at a time they are struggling to meet the revenue targets for the year. According to the FFC, India’s overall tax-to-GDP ratio is about 17.2%, which as per its calculations, should be about 22.6%.

There is a gap of about 5.4%, of which, GST compliance gap accounts for about 2.4% of the GDP, according to the FFC presentation, the highlights of which are now available in public domain from minutes of the meeting.

Source: Hindustan-Times

National Anti Profiteering Authority (NAA)

Anti-profiteering body steps up GST compliance drive

January 16, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

A wave of orders is expected from the National Anti-profiteering Authority (NAA) in the next three months, with the Centre stepping up a goods and services tax (GST) compliance drive.

About 40 orders are expected to be issued shortly on complaints against firms in the real estate, consumer goods, and cinema industries, said a person with direct knowledge of the matter, who requested anonymity.

The firms facing investigations include some the leading suppliers of ayurvedic products, electronics and television makers, luggage and travel accessories makers, two leading multiplex chains, and hygiene and home products firms, said a second person aware of the matter.

This comes amid concern among policymakers that businesses have pocketed part of the ₹1 trillion worth of GST rate cuts that were to benefit end-users and thus help stimulate demand in the economy.

In the past, about 60% of the cases investigated by the Directorate General of Anti-Profiteering (DGAP) have confirmed profiteering behaviour by businesses. The NAA has issued orders on more than 100 cases since it came into force in November 2017. Its orders have led to businesses depositing about ₹600 crore in profiteered amount to a consumer welfare fund managed by the consumer affairs ministry, said the first person mentioned above.

Authorities intend to take more measures to reach out to consumers and sensitise them about their rights and remedies. Towards this, the government has decided to direct erring companies to deposit the profiteered amounts in a separate fund to be used for GST-related purposes.

“While some of the large brands have started passing on the GST rate reduction benefits, several others, especially the mid-sized ones, have not revised maximum retail price downwards and, hence, only one in three consumers have validated the reduction in MRPs,” said Sachin Taparia, founder and chairman of LocalCircles, an online community of consumers. Their survey last month covering more than 14,000 citizens showed that a large section of customers believe they are not getting the benefits of the tax cuts that came into force on 1 January 2019.

Source: Live-Mint.

States seek real-time access to GST returns, e-way bills

January 6, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

Certain states have sought real-time access to annual Goods and Services Tax (GST) returns and e-way bills in order to check tax evasion, which can potentially address the ongoing fund crunch and help compensate states for their revenue shortfall, two officials aware of the matter said requesting anonymity.

Currently, these data are stored in the GST Network, which compiles reports and sends them to all the states and Union territories with a time lag.

Kerala finance minister Thomas Isaac confirmed the development and said,“Kerala may not require compensation cess at all if it is permitted to have real-time access to annual returns and e-way bills, so that tax evasion could be curbed,” Isaac said.

According to Isaac, ineffective tax collection is one of the three key reasons for tardy GST revenue collections across the country and real-time information would help many states nab evaders through the use of data analytics. The other two reasons, according to him, are the economic slowdown and steep cuts in GST rates.

“I will raise this issue in the GST Council,” he said. The GST Council is the apex decision-making body of the federal indirect tax structure that was rolled out on July 1, 2017. It is chaired by the Union finance minister and has finance ministers of states and Union territories as members.

Officials said states’ access to real-time data could be possible if they formally raised the issue at the council. Several states have been raising the issue of large-scale GST evasion at the council. In August last year, West Bengal finance minister Amit Mitra estimated GST evasion at ₹1 lakh crore and demanded an exclusive meeting on the issue.

Owing to inadequate compensation cess funds, the Centre has not yet compensated states for their revenue shortfall over two months – October and November. Ideally, that should have been paid by the second week of December. Even in the past, there was a delay of about two months in paying compensation for August and September, which was paid just two days ahead of the 38th GST Council meeting on December 18, 2019.

An amount of ₹35,298 crore was released on December 16 to pay states for their dues in August and September. The GST law assures states 14% growth in their revenue for five years and the Centre is committed to meeting any shortfall in revenue through cess money, which is levied on luxury goods and sin products such as liquor, cigarettes and tobacco products.

The finance minister of another state, who did not wish to be named, said that there was scope for improvement in GST compliance but that would not be able to meet the entire revenue gap. Commenting on the proposal on real-time access to GSTN data, the minister said, “I doubt this will eliminate the revenue deficit. The ball is always in our court , provided those at the helm allow it to be dealt with efficiently.”

Experts said access to data would certainly help states in better compliance. Common access could be given to states through login IDs and passwords. Pratik Jain, partner and leader, indirect tax, said, “Logistically it should not be difficult.”

The Union government is making all-out efforts to plug revenue leakages of both central GST (CGST) and state GST (SGST). It will hold a national conference on January 7 to address the issue, the officials cited above said. This conference is being organised to curb fraud and evasion and check fake input-tax credits.

Source: Hindustan-Times

GST tops Rs 1 lakh crore on compliance, festival boost

December 2, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

Buoyed by festival demand and better compliance, goods and services tax (GST) collections rose 6% in November to top Rs 1.03 lakh crore — the highest since April. Monthly collections in November were the third highest since the transition to the new indirect tax regime in July 2017.

The previous highs were witnessed in April 2019 (nearly Rs 1.14 lakh crore) and March 2019 (over Rs 1.06 lakh crore). But the mop-up grew 3.7% during April-November, compared to the annual target of 13%, prompting officials to suggest that the shortfall in collections could be of the order of Rs 1.5 lakh crore.

“While increase in collection is encouraging, it’s difficult to read too much into the collection for one month, particularly because October was also a month of festivals. We need to see what’s the trend. The government has taken steps in the right direction by simplifying the compliances, going after the tax evaders by more efficient use of technology/data analytics and not falling for temptation of increasing the tax rates. These efforts, coupled with introduction of e-invoicing from next year should lead to gradual increase in GST collections as well, though it would also depend upon overall economy,” said Pratik Jain, who leads the indirect tax practice at consulting firm PwC.

Data released on Sunday suggested that domestic demand — manifested in central and state GST collections — was strong, but an over 13% fall in integrated GST on imports exerted pressure on overall collections. Higher automobile and white goods sales ahead of Diwali helped collections with the government hoping that good monsoon and rural demand will come to its rescue in the remaining part of the current financial year. An official statement seemed to draw comfort from the fact that a decline in GST on imports in November was 13%, compared to 20% in the previous month.

The government was also cheering a near 12% jump in returns for October sales filed by the November 20 deadline with the number of submissions on the GST Network portal touching 77.8 lakh, following a series of steps introduced by the government to improve compliance. For instance, those who do not file returns have now been barred from generating electronic way bills, which is mandatory to ship any consignment of over Rs 50,000.

Source: Times-Of-India

GST: Evasion, returns and revenue boosting measures to feature at officers’ meet Monday

November 7, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

Tax officers from the states and the Centre will get together for a day-long meeting on Monday to discuss administrative, legal, revenue and implementation-related issues under the indirect tax regime.

This will mark a first of its kind interaction between central and state tax officers, delinked from the agenda of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council meeting. Usually, officer-level meetings have always taken place a day before the GST Council meetings, mainly to discuss measures outlined in the Council’s meeting agenda.

As slowing revenues under the GST have become a concern, officials from the states and the Centre will discuss measures for anti-evasion, revenue augmentation, compliance, returns filing and online system, officials said. The rates of goods and services will, however, not be discussed since those pertain to the GST Council, they said.

Officials said this meeting would be more broad-based, wherein states and the Centre would have a common platform to discuss measures to streamline and regularise many pending issues under the GST. The tax officials are expected to take up issues related to e-way bills, delay in filing returns, IT matters, pending legislative changes, and methods to ensure greater coordination between states and Centre under GST, they said.

“This method to have a common platform for discussion between states and Centre is being tried for the first time. The idea was not to club it with a GST Council meeting and have an open agenda meeting. This was felt necessary so as to develop a mechanism for similar discussions going ahead. The officer-level meetings before Council meetings, otherwise, have too many agenda items and not everything gets discussed in detail,” one of the officials said.

Apart from the administrative- and implementation-related issues, pending legal changes would also be discussed. Another official said many states have not followed up on the amendments in the Central GST (CGST) Act with changes in their respective State GST (SGST) Acts, so much so that in some places there is a time lag of six months. “Such issues need to be prioritised since they are creating a hurdle in proper implementation of GST and would be raised in the meeting,” the official said.

The plan to hold this meeting comes even though the Council last month constituted a committee of officials from states and the Centre for revenue augmentation and looking into wider range of reforms such as systemic changes in the GST, including checks and balances to prevent misuse, measures to improve voluntary compliance, improved compliance monitoring and anti-evasion measures. The committee, which was earlier supposed to submit its report within 15 days, has so far met only once and is now likely to be given an extension of 1-2 months, officials said.”The committee has a wide range of topics in its terms of reference, so it would take time,” an official said.

GST collections in October contracted by 5.29 per cent to Rs 95,380 crore from Rs 1,00,710 crore in the year-ago month, marking the third instance of a contraction since the July 2017 roll-out of the indirect tax regime.

Source: indian-Express

Nirmala Sitharaman promises further GST simplification to help India improve business ranking

October 25, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday said efforts will be made to further simplify goods and services tax (GST), and expressed hope that it will help in further improving India’s ranking in the World Bank’s ease of doing business index.

India has jumped 14 places to rank 63rd out of 190 countries in the World Bank’s ease of doing business 2020 report on account of significant improvement in resolving insolvency and obtaining construction permits.

The other parameters where the country has done well include trading across borders, registering property, paying taxes, getting electricity connections and starting a business.

However, the improvement in the remaining three parameters — getting credit, protecting minority investors, enforcing contracts — are not impressive.

Sitharaman said that the effort will be now to achieve the target to reaching within top 50 rank.

She added that as there is just one rank improvement in the parameter of starting a business, enough effort will be made to improve on this scale, as it is a “very critical” in a cycle of an industry.

“In GST, it is an ongoing process to understand where the difficulties are…We are also looking at what were the glitches in using online filing of returns. So, GST is an ongoing process in improving. Even now for the next meeting, as and when it happens, we want to make sure that several steps are taken to simplify compliance,” she said.

On income tax front, she said: “At this stage, there may not be much to say.”

The minister also said from next year two more cities – Kolkata and Bengaluru – will be included in the preparation of the ranking index. Currently, the report covers Delhi and Mumbai.

“Till now two cities in India were covered all these years. For a large country and regional diversity being so distinct, we were impressing upon the World Bank that having just two cities may not be adequately representative. So, from the coming year Kolkata and Bengaluru will be added to the list of cities,” she told reporters here.

With this, the World Bank will take views of industry from these two cities while formulating the ranking index.

The minister said that there is a significant jump in the parameter of resolving insolvency, “but that does not make me complacent”.

“We have to go within top 50th. So, all efforts from now will be moving in that direction,” she said.

She added that on obtaining electricity connection parameter, work has to be done at state level.

“In trading across borders and registering property, improvement can be even much more,” the minister said.

Speaking on the parameter of getting credit, chief economic adviser Krishnamurthy Subramanian said the current outreach programme being undertaken by the banks has helped in improving credit access.

“Close to Rs 80,000 crore credit has been given, of which 43 per cent is new term loans. One lakh MSMEs have been sanctioned loans close to Rs 8,500 crore, three lakh loans to agri, which is close to about Rs 4,600 crore,” Subramanian said.

India has continuously improved its ranking from 142 in 2014 to 63rd this year – out of 190 countries, which are ranked by the bank’s ‘Doing Business’ 2020 report.

Source: Times-Of-India.

23% GST payers can file returns via SMS from April

October 4, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

One in five GST payer will get away without having to file monthly or quarterly returns from April. Instead of filling up the form online, all that those with ‘Nil’ returns will have to do is to send an SMS to a specified number and confirm it using a one-time password.

The move is part of the overall exercise to simplify compliance as many of the ‘Nil’ return filers, who account for almost 23% of the 1.2 crore GST base, had registered to be eligible for contracts from government and other agencies but do not undertake any business.

Once the new returns kick in from April, over 70% of those registered for GST can make do with quarterly filing of returns as their turnover is less than the specified level of Rs 5 crore. “Only 7% of the taxpayers with annual turnover of over Rs 5 crore will have to file monthly returns,” said Prakash Kumar, chief executive of GST Network that provides the IT backbone for the indirect tax regime and has developed the new forms.

More than 51% of the taxpayers can use the SMS-based compliance tool or opt for Sahaj, the form meant for those entities with B2C transactions and have an annual turnover of less than Rs 5 crore.

GST, which was launched over two years ago, had faced severe criticism as businesses, especially the smaller ones, complained of stiff compliance burden that required three-stage filing. Through the new forms, the government has sought to reduce the compliance burden with smaller businesses required to file quarterly returns, although taxes will have to be paid on a monthly basis.

Source: Times-of-India

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CBIC extends due date of GST compliance of E-Way Bill in respect of goods sent/taken on approval for Sale/Return are removed before the Supply takes place

September 22, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

Government rolls out facility of filing of Nil GST return through SMS

June 8, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

GST portal glitches to dominate agenda of Council meeting on Saturday

March 10, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

Non-compliance in GST payments may be burning a Rs 5 tn hole in revenues

January 21, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

Anti-profiteering body steps up GST compliance drive

January 16, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

States seek real-time access to GST returns, e-way bills

January 6, 2020 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

GST tops Rs 1 lakh crore on compliance, festival boost

December 2, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

GST: Evasion, returns and revenue boosting measures to feature at officers’ meet Monday

November 7, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

Nirmala Sitharaman promises further GST simplification to help India improve business ranking

October 25, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment

XaTTaX is Best GST Software, Simplify your Financial matters with GST eFiling Software for Return Filing & GST Billing Software in India.

23% GST payers can file returns via SMS from April

October 4, 2019 admin Comments 0 Comment