The government today extended the deadline for small businesses to opt for the composition scheme in the GST regime by nearly four weeks to August 16.
The government today extended the deadline for small businesses to opt for the composition scheme in the GST regime by nearly four weeks to August 16.
Small businesses with turnover of up to Rs 75 lakh earlier had time till today to opt for the scheme in the Goods and Services Tax regime. “The Board hereby extends the period for filing an intimation in Form GST CMP-01… up to August 16, 2017,” the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) said in an office order.
To opt for composition scheme, the taxpayer needs to log into his account at the GST Portal www.gst.gov.in and select ‘Application to opt for the Composition Scheme’ under ‘Services’ menu. They have to fill up the Form GST CMP-01 to opt for the scheme.
Under composition scheme, traders, manufacturers and restaurants can pay tax at 1, 2 and 5 per cent, respectively. Businesses opting for the composition scheme will see a lesser compliance burden as they will have to file returns only once in a quarter as against monthly returns to be filed by other businesses.
There are over 70 lakh excise, VAT and service taxpayers who have migrated to the GSTN portal for filing returns in the GST regime which kicked in from July 1. Besides, there are over 8 lakh new taxpayers who have registered on the portal. These new registered taxpayers can opt for the composition scheme at the time of registration.
In the past week, the government has reached out to tax commissioners on the audit process, highlighting the risk areas.
The Centre has created a detailed road map for goods and services tax (GST) audits barely 20 days after the levy’s rollout, listing risks, target industries and even potential auditees for officials examining corporate India’s transition to the new regime.
In the past week, the government has reached out to tax commissioners on the audit process, highlighting the risk areas. Beginning next week, therefore, officials could visit companies to assess whether the transition from the multiple to the single producer levy from July 1 stuck to the rule book.
Their mode of inspection will also be very different from the traditional script. “They would focus on credit transfer or transition from the old tax regime to GST. The government already has the requisite sets of data in place for this,” a tax official told ET on the condition of anonymity.
The government has shared sector-wise “risk factors” companies might exploit to avoid paying GST. According to the tax official quoted above, categorisation or risk evaluation for these audits has been created by using Big Data analytics.
The government has used statistics of the last two financial years to create the audit checklist.
In the internal government note shared with middle-rung tax officials, they have also been told to cause the “least inconvenience” to auditees and to even educate the taxpayers, especially small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
Industry experts, however, pointed out that a granular scrutiny could mean additional tax-related effort at many companies, as the GST audits would also take earlier taxes into account while evaluating the transition.
‘Extra book-keeping effort’
“The decision to focus on risk-based parameters in determining the audit plan is good. However, since the audits to be undertaken now would focus on earlier legislation such as excise and service tax, taxpayers will grapple with both the earlier legislation and the new legislation (GST) simultaneously,” said MS Mani, partner, GST, Deloitte India. “It would significantly increase the focus and time taken to attend to tax matters.”
A list of auditees, made up of large, medium, and small-scale companies across the country, was also shared with the tax commissioners. “Most of the companies have manipulated the system while transitioning credits from excise and service tax to GST. This is what would be the focus of the tax audits initially,” a senior tax official told ET.
Tax officials have been asked to first examine a specific list of companies. This was disclosed in an official communication by the director general of audit, central taxes, on July 12, with several mid-level tax officials being informed this week.
Big Data analytics are being used by the tax departments since 2016. The tool is deployed to find outliers in any industry, and the gap from industry based average taxes is used to determine targets for further scrutiny.
“The government would have comparables. Say, if 10 consumer goods companies of a particular size pay Rs 50 crore in taxes, it is unlikely that one company, of the same revenue size, would pay Rs 1 crore. Data analytics could easily point out such anomalies, and the lens would then be on such companies,” a person in the know said.
YES Bank has teamed up with the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) and Wells Fargo on an agreement to lend up to $150 million to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in India.
Under the agreement, OPIC will provide $75 million in financing and up to $75 million in syndicated financing jointly with Wells Fargo to YES Bank.
Specifically, $50 million of the financing will be used to expand support to women-owned businesses, while another $50 million will be used for financing SME businesses in low-income States, YES Bank said in a statement.
It added that this will ensure access to funding for women-owned businesses and SMEs in India.
OPIC is the US government’s development finance institution. San Francisco-headquartered Wells Fargo is a diversified, community-based financial services company with $2 trillion in assets.
Rana Kapoor, Managing Director and CEO, YES Bank, said: “This facility will support financing to women entrepreneurs in India for driving future economic growth and job creation.”
Dev Jagadesan, OPIC’s Acting President and CEO, said, “OPIC’s facility will help YES Bank expand its SME lending capacity, specifically enabling them to reach both women and entrepreneurs in low-income States who have much to contribute to India’s economic activity.”
According to the statement, this is the third transaction between OPIC and YES Bank and comes close on the heels of last year’s $265-million OPIC facility, which the bank will use to extend SME financing in India.
The private sector bank said it has also partnered with International Finance Corporation and Women Entrepreneurs Opportunity Facility by drawing a $50-million loan in March 2016 for mobilising capital for women entrepreneurs.
Small businesses with turnover of up to Rs. 75 lakh have time till July 21 to opt for composition scheme under the Goods and Services Tax regime, GST Network said.
To opt for composition scheme, the taxpayer needs to log into his account at the GST Portal www.gst.gov.in and select ’Application to opt for the Composition Scheme’ under ’Services’ menu, a GSTN statement said.
“Any person who has been granted registration on a provisional basis and has turnover not exceeding Rs. 75 lakh, and who wishes to opt for the composition levy, is required to electronically file an intimation, duly signed or verified through EVC, at the GST portal on or before July 21, 2017,” GSTN Chairman Navin Kumar said.
Under composition scheme, traders, manufacturers and restaurants can pay tax at one per cent, two per cent and five per cent, respectively in the new indirect tax regime.
Businesses opting for composition scheme will see a lesser compliance burden as they will have to file returns only once in a quarter as against monthly returns to be filed by other businesses.
There are over 69 lakh excise, VAT and service taxpayers who have migrated to the GSTN portal for filing returns in the GST regime which ushered in on July 1.
Besides, there are over 4.5 lakh new taxpayers who have registered in the portal. These new registered taxpayers can opt for the composition scheme at the time of registration.
GSTN also clarified that taxpayers who have been given provisional IDs must complete all parts of the enrolment at the GST portal and submit the same along with the required documents with digital signature or EVC.
Once the form is completed and submitted, the enrolled taxpayer will be issued the final Certificate of Registration which would mark completion of migration under GST.
In case an enrolled taxpayer fails to submit the duly filled form with the requisite documents, his provisional registration is liable to be cancelled.
“A period of three months is allowed to complete the enrolment procedure by September 22, 2017. In the interim, they can issue tax invoice using the provisional ID already allotted to them,” Kumar said.
Contrary to gloomy predictions, the roll-out of the goods and services tax (GST) has been a much smoother affair and the industry has adapted to it without major hassles.
Contrary to gloomy predictions, the roll-out of the goods and services tax (GST) has been a much smoother affair and the industry has adapted to it without major hassles. As FE spoke to a cross-section of the industry, several government officials and the administrative and field levels, tax experts and analysts, some things came out clearly: The gap between the country’s existing indirect tax assessee base and those registered on the GST Network has almost vanished, indicating that even large sections of small businesses that had the option of composition scheme decided to join the GST bandwagon. Grouses over the compliance burden that the new tax has imposed on small businesses are fast disappearing except for the cavils of those not wanting to report their entire transaction volume for fear of increased income tax liability. There are of course some niggling issues like how to compute the tax liability under the reverse charge mechanism but these too are getting resolved.
FE spoke to Delhi-based companies consisting of electronics dealers, auto parts dealers, small chartered accountant (CA) firms among others. While most of the businesses were VAT assessees in the previous era, the CA firm registered on the GSTN portal as a first-time taxpayer.
“Migrating to GSTN was a simple process that only took ten minutes,” Nitin Gupta of Siyaram Bros, a company sells automobile parts to retailers across the country. Gupta said with over `30 crore in annual turnover, his company has had a smooth ride in the first ten days of the new indirect taxation regime, that marks a giant leap towards a one-nation- one-tax regime. Although, businesses have often stated that filing returns in GST would be complicated, Gupta said that most of the processes are similar to what companies were doing under the VAT system. “We are still a month away from filing the first return but I don’t see a problem,” he said.
Govind Kumar of Baba Computers and Sandeep Mittal of Mittal Sandeep and Associates, a CA firm, concurred.
For them, the GSTN registration did not involve any glitches. Both the companies had been using accounting and tax software from Tally, and have now switched to GST-enabled version of the same. The software solution is expected to cost about `11,000 per year.
Gupta, however, added that those retailers the company deals with have been in state of panic largely due to lack of awareness. The company expects smooth flow of input tax credits as it buys from big businesses who are expected to be GST-compliant. “Some of the retailers who we sell to may not be ready, which could impact our sale volume,” Gupta said.
Mittal, who runs the CA firm, said that most of his clients were assessees before and have migrated to GSTN without a hiccup. Among other issues, his firm has advised small businesses on whether to opt for general GSTN registration or become a taxpayer under composition scheme.
The scheme allows easier compliance for certain businesses with annual turnover of less than Rs 75 lakh. However, according to the law, firms under the scheme can neither avail input tax credit nor supply to other states.
“Most of my client deal with inter-state supplies and hence they aren’t eligible for the composition scheme so far,” Mittal said. He added that he has advised a few firm to opt for the scheme based on a cost-benefit analysis but even these businesses are keen to avail input tax credits.
Speaking about the the issues faced by his business, Gupta admitted that he wasn’t quite clear about the reverse charge mechanism and how to deposit tax collected under it with the government at the time of filing returns.
According to GST law, a recipient is required to collect and deposit taxes under reverse charge mechanism for certain services including transportation. Of the 81 lakh existing taxpayers, 68 lakh have migrated to GSTN while nearly 2 lakh new taxpayers have also registered on the portal at the end of June. The GST tax base appearing smaller than in the previous regime is a misnomer. Earlier, a large section of the taxpayers needed to register seperately with the Centre (for excise, countervailing duty on imports and service tax) and states (for VAT). The GST has removed these duplications.
For decades, Sugal & Damani Group focused on lotteries before it entered the online bill payment business with Payworld.
Now, it has become a GST service provider (GSP), an entity that will help businesses register, upload electronic invoices and file on the technology platform, and plans to leverage its network.
Pune-based Vayana Network has been working with small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to arrange funds and has no experience of taxation, but it too has become a GSP and is eyeing business from companies, their vendors as well as standalone SMEs.
Besides GSPs, GST has given birth to another set of entities called ‘application service providers’ or ASPs that will use sales and purchase data from taxpayers and convert it into GST returns for filing online.GST is spawning a $2 billion-3 billion (Rs 13,000 crore-20,000 crore) industry comprising software service providers, ASPs and GSPs, chartered accountants and consulting firms as the entire industry is undergoing business process re-engineering.
SAP and Oracle, the big daddies of the ERP business, may mop up revenues of at least $1 billion (Rs 6,500 crore) over the next two years, industry players say.
Homegrown Tally Solutions, which has close to 11 lakh users of its accounting software, has already got around six lakh subscriptions from businesses, which entitles them to free upgrades and access to all information.
While the cost of software varies between Rs 18,000 and Rs 54,000, each annual subscription fetches the company Rs 3,600 (for a single user) to Rs 10,800 (multiple users).
With 10,000 melas planned in the next one month, the company is out to garner as much business as possible while helping businesses tackle GST, said Tally Systems executive director Tejas Goenka.
Even a smaller player like the newly set up Ginesys is eyeing a turnover of around Rs 100 crore in three years, said co-founder Ashish Mittal. Then, there are the likes of ClearTax, which was set up to file income tax returns. Sensing a huge business opportunity it has expanded into the GST arena with its software and tie-ups with around 10,000 chartered accountants, said ClearTax founder CEO Archit Gupta.
Not surprisingly, companies have hired big time to meet the required demand. SAP and its partners have around 500-600 people working on implementing ERP solutions, business filing, supply chain and the app for filing returns, said Neeraj Athalye, who leads the firm’s GST adoption drive. Cleartax has hired around 400 in the last one year or so.The big four accounting firms too have ramped up. Deloitte’s indirect tax team has around 250 new recruits, while PwC has expanded its pool of CAs and systems executives by 200-250. While the billing for large companies runs into crores, including consulting services, the smaller companies are banking on volumes with some charging a fee of as low as Rs 100-200 a month for filing returns.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is looking into a request to extend the classification period for non-performing assets (NPAs) to help small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
“Some people have made representation to the finance ministry of raising the NPA classification period beyond existing 90 days. This issue is under consideration. It is being examined by the RBI,” Minister of State for Finance Arjun Ram Meghwal told newswire PTI.
Summary
RBI looking at request to raise the NPA classification period beyond the current level.
Currently, an account turns into NPA or bad loan if it is not serviced for 90 days.
In case of small businesses and SMEs, payments come usually late.
Currently, an account turns into a non-performing asset (NPA) or bad loan if it is not serviced for 90 days.In case of small businesses and SMEs, payments come usually late. Once they miss the 90-day period and fall in the NPA category, their credit line is cut.
In the absence of vibrant factoring or trade receivable market, small businesses and SMEs face the issue of timely credit availability. Meghwal also said that there is a need to strengthen loan restructuring mechanism in an effort to tackle inflation.
Loan restructuring is reviewed by the RBI from time to time as part of its effort to fight the mounting NPAs in the banking system.
Most recently, the minister said, the government brought in an ordinance giving wide-ranging legislative powers to the Reserve Bank to fight NPAs.
The ordinance authorises RBI to issue directions to any bank to initiate insolvency resolution process in the event of a default under the provisions of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), 2016.
As per some estimates, banks are sitting on unrecognised stressed loans worth Rs 7.7 lakh crore in corporate and SME sectors and expect around 35 per cent of them to slip into the NPA category in the next 12-18 months.
There is a likelihood of Rs 2.6 lakh crore of corporate and SME loans, which are 3.2 per cent of total bank credit to be recognised as stressed loans by 2019.
Stressed loans include restructured assets that carry the risk of turning into NPAs.
The government has shared sector-wise “risk factors” companies might exploit to avoid paying GST. According to the tax official quoted above, categorisation or risk evaluation for these audits has been created by using Big Data analytics.
