Paperless I-T assessment: CBDT plans to take project to more taxpayers

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After successfully completing over 1,000 scrutiny I-T assessments under a maiden taxpayer-friendly paperless inquiry system, CBDT is set to extend the initiative as it is mulling seeking taxpayers’ consent to opt for the scheme at ITR filing stage itself.

Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), the policy-making body of the Income Tax department, had launched a pilot project last year to reduce taxpayers’ visit to the tax office and their interface with the taxman.

Under the project, the first set of e-communications were decided to be mailed to the assessees in DELHI, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad and Chennai region.

As per official data accessed by PTI, the department in these five cities has completed scrutiny assessments in 1,001 cases till now, after a total of 6,481 assesses were contacted of which 1,812 responded positively.

A senior official said the biggest “challenge” in achieving better success in this new project was obtaining the consent of the taxpayers.

The Assessing Officers (AOs) found that while in some cases the taxpayer could not be reached as their personal email ids were with their CAs or authorised representatives, in a few other cases the assessee withdrew his consent to join the scheme, the official said.

“It is now being mulled if the I-T department can print a footnote on the Income Tax Return (ITR) or on the scrutiny notice itself that the taxpayer is invited to participate in the exercise over email in a paperless manner.

“The results are encouraging and the CBDT wants to make this an institutional system for scrutiny assessments henceforth,” the official said, adding the scheme is expected to be widened and rolled out with new features within this financial year.
The success of the project, initiated last year, is evident from the fact that CBDT recently added two more cities (Hyderabad and Kolkata), to the existing five metros, under the paperless assessment system exercise.

With this project, CBDT aims to end corruption and bring hassle-free experience for the taxpayers who undergo a time-consuming scrutiny assessment procedure which entails production of a number of documents and financial statements.

The department, however, says it brings only about 1 per cent of cases under the said procedure.

An official notification had been issued earlier which spells out the procedure, formats and standards for ensuring “secured transmission” of emails between the AO and the assessee stating all communication between the two sides will be done in PDF file format and over bonafide email ids.

This followed an amendment in the I-T Act in December last year, which allowed emails to become the new mode of interaction between the AO and the tax-paying individual.

Under the new procedure, the taxman will send emails, for issuing notices and summons, through the government registered ‘@incometax.gov.in’ email domain and the attached PDF document will have his or her designation and signature.

In response to such I-T notice, taxpayers will have to submit the details called for, in a Portable Document Format (PDF) through their email id registered with the department.

The notification states, “Any email, in response to the notice issued by the AO, received from the primary email address of the assessee, shall be considered as a valid response to the notice.”

In the same notification, CBDT had also mandated that the taxman will maintain an audit trail of all e-communication with a taxpayer in the IT department’s central database for future reference and as record management of the entire transaction.

The new directives also allow a taxpayer to physically submit a reply to such e-notices in case of a technical problem in their email. “This shall be treated as adequate compliance,” it had said.

The project was launched after CBDT had asked the I-T department to “initiate the concept of using emails for corresponding with taxpayers and sending through emails the questionnaire, notice etc at the time of scrutiny proceedings and getting responses from them”.

“This would eliminate the necessity of visiting the Income Tax offices by the taxpayers, particularly in smaller cases, involving limited issues and where taxpayer is able to provide details required by the AO without necessitating his physical presence,” the order had said.

Source : http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/53061801.cms

 

Double taxpayer base to 100 million, PM tells taxmen

by | posted in: Corporate Updates, Economy, Business Updates, Corporate Affairs, Income Tax,e-Filing- Individuals, Firms, Companies | 0
Prime Minister Narendra Modi (right) and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at the first Rajasva Gyan Sangam in New Delhi.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi pitched for nearly doubling of tax base to 10 crore assesses while addressing tax officers in the first ever Rajasva Gyan Sangam that kick-started on Thursday.

Modi outlined a five-point charter for tax administrators – RAPID, which stands for Revenue, Accountability, Probity,  Information and Digitisation to reform the taxation system in the country.

MODI’S FOUR COMMANDMENTS FOR TAX DEPARTMENT:
  • Increase tax base to 100 million people from 54.3 million now
  • Focus on RAPID: Revenue, Accountability, Probity, Information and Digitisation
  • Ensure simplification and go for total digitisation
  • Turn Gyan Sangam into a Karma Sangam, so ideas generated here lead to concrete action on the ground

 

In an hour-long interaction, he urged officers to build a ‘bridge of confidence’ between tax payers and tax officials, stressing on incorporating a sense of trust in the system so that they pay taxes without fear or harassment.

 

“While there should be respect for the rule of law among all citizens, and even fear of the long arm of the law for those who evade taxes, people should not fear tax administrators,” Modi said in his interaction with tax officers.

 

Citing the example of the “Give it up” initiative for voluntarily giving up gas subsidy, he said that the tax base too could be increased significantly, provided the tax administrators can demonstrate the leadership to bring about a change.

 

This is for the first time that the two boards — Central Board of Direct Taxes and Central Board of Excise and Customs — came together for the joint conference.  Earlier they held separate conferences with the Finance Minister as the chief guest.

 

Modi said that tax officials should act like “mentors of taxpayers” and not treat them as “tax evaders”.

 

“People of India are inherently honest. If you build trust then people will pay taxes and you will be able to achieve the target,” Modi said.

 

The conclave will deliberate on a host of issues related to taxpayer services and effective implementation of fiscal laws and government policies with discussions around government’s financial inclusion initiatives, ensuring a transparent tax regime for businesses and foreign investors besides issues and challenges being faced by the two tax departments.


Minister of state for finance Jayant Sinha in a briefing after the first session said, “Prime Minister laid out certain goals and objectives for the officials to increase the tax base to 10 crore from 5.43 crore at present.”

Sinha said of the 25 crore households in the country, 15 crore are agriculturalists and hence the remaining 10 crore should be under the tax net.

 

Modi in his speech said 92% of tax department revenue comes from TDS, advance tax and self assessment tax, while the remaining 8% comes after scrutiny.

 

He said if 42,000 officials of CBDT are engaged for ensuring direct tax revenue, then the tax net should increase further.

 

Stating that the country is filled with “aspirational people”, Modi urged the taxmen to take steps so that people find it easier to pay taxes here.

 

Prime minister emphasized that people in India mostly pay taxes and the number of people who want to evade it is less.

 

“People don’t have problem in paying tax. So there is no question of tax evasion. The issue is how much cooperative are we in dealing with people. He said you should behave like mentors with the people rather than evader… If you become taxpayer friendly, then taxes will automatically come to you,” Modi said.

 

During the brainstorming session, he pressed officers to move towards digitisation besides making tax administration better and efficient.

 

The two-day Gyan Sangam is being attended by close to 250 officers of the rank of Principal Chief Commissioners, Chief Commissioners and Principal Commissioners from CBDT and 170 from the CBEC.

 

During the interaction, Modi said if someone Googles ‘how to pay taxes in India’, there will be seven crore results. If the question of ‘how not to pay taxes in India’ is put to Google, there would be 12 crore feeds.

 

The tax officials in their interaction with the prime minister gave a host of suggestions, which included to setting up of National Tax Facilitation Act to regulate basic norms of tax collection.

 

Ideas and views were expressed on diverse subjects such as digitization, voluntary tax compliance, facilitation for taxpayers, increasing the tax base, upgradation of digital and physical infrastructure for tax administrators etc.

 

Modi urged officers to turn the Gyan Sangam into a Karma Sangam, so that the ideas generated from this conference lead to concrete action on the ground.

 

As many as 15 officers from the CBDT and CBEC posed their questions to Prime Minister on various issues being faced by them in their regular work.

 

The issues included dilemma over whether officials should act as law enforcement agency or taxpayer friendly agency while collecting due taxes from people.

 

They also raised the issue of voluntary tax compliance, increasing tax base, upgradation of digital and physical infrastructure for tax administrators.

Source: Business Standard

As income-tax returns filing date nears, 7 documents to be kept ready

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The income-tax returns filing season is fast approaching with the initial deadline being July 31. 

The income-tax returns filing season is fast approaching with the initial deadline being July 31. You must be among those preparing to file your returns. But most tax assessees who are required to e-file their returns keep deferring till the last moment.

 

However, even if you are procrastinating, you need to be prepared with all the details that you need to provide in your tax returns. And for that you need a lot of documents to be with you. It may not easy to source these documents at the last moment since some have to obtained from your office, some come by mail and others need to be downloaded. And even if you have all of documents with you, you need to have them filed in a file that is easy to locate.

 

So what are these documents that you need to keep handy at the time of filing? FeMoney asked tax expert Sudhir Kaushik, Co-founder and CFO, Taxspanner.com on documents that are a must in hand. “Keeping documents like Form 16, Form 26AS and home or education loan certificates for obtaining deductions would ensure that your tax filing is hassle-free and complete,” Kaushik said.

 

Here are a list of documents that Kaushik says one should be ready with while filing tax returns:

 

Form-16 and Form-16A

Form-16 is the most basic source of information about the income earned and the tax deducted from your salary during the year. In case you have worked for more than one employer during the financial year 2015-16 then you must collect your Form 16 from all of them. Form 16-A form is also called a Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) certificate and is issued by banks for interest income, capital gains of NRIs, etc. If you have rental income and your landlord has deducted TDS on rent then you should collect Form-16A from the landlord too. Similarly, if you have any commission or professional income, TDS certificate for the same should also be collected.

 

Form-26AS

Your income from all sources, tax deductions and any high-value transaction(s) are reported in this form. I-T department sends notices if the ITR filed by the taxpayer does not match with the information available in Form-26AS. You should get your Form 26AS and match details with your ITR before filing it. If there is some mismatch, you should fix those errors and then file your return. You can download Form-26AS from your net banking account, directly from income-tax department’s website.

 

Bank statements from all bank accounts

You should verify that all the bank transactions carried out during the financial year with respect to income earned, investments made, expenses etc. have been declared in the appropriate sections of your return. This would show dividend income or gifts received above Rs 50,000 on which tax needs to be paid.

 

Home/education loan interest certificates

If you have taken any home/education loan then collect their interest certificate from the lender to claim the right deduction.

 

Investment proofs not submitted to employer

It is possible that some of the investments made by you during the financial year have not been included in the Form-16 issued to you. For example, if you invested in tax-saving tools such as life insurance, Public Provident Fund after proof submission deadline set by your employer, proofs of these investments would not have been submitted to your employer. For such investments, you need to have the proofs for reference while preparing your return.

 

Share/mutual fund transaction statements

These are required to enter details like sale date, purchase date, quantity and amount for computing capital gains/loss.

 

Tax payment challan(s)

If you have paid advance tax and/or self assessment tax then you need to enter the details of the same in your return for accurate computation of tax liability.

Source: http://www.financialexpress.com/article/personal-finance/income-tax-returns-filing-date-july-31-nears-7-documents-to-be-kept-ready/277141/

E-filing of tax returns via ATM

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The Income Tax department has launched an ATM-based validation system for filing e-ITRs by taxpayers as part of its measure to enhance the paperless regime of filing the annual IT returns.

“Now, Electronic Verification Code (EVC) can be generated by pre-validating your Automated Teller Machine (ATM) provided by the bank where a taxpayer has an account. While SBI has activated the facility beginning yesterday, other banks will follow soon,” a senior IT official said.

Last month, the department had launched the bank account based validation facility in this regard for those who have not availed internet banking facility. The new facility is available on the official e-filing portal of the department – http://incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in/ and will work by using the One Time Password verification system as activated by the department last year by using the Aadhaar number.

Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/economy/policy/efiling-of-tax-returns-via-atm/article8693669.ece

Corporate Affairs Ministry again extends statutory filing deadline amid MCA21 woes

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Extending the deadline for the third time, Corporate Affairs Ministry has now given time till July 7 for companies to submit their statutory filings as issues related to MCA21 portal are yet to be fully resolved.

MCA21 is used for making electronic filings under the Companies Act and is managed by Infosys  for the ministry.

The upgraded system went live in the last week of March and stakeholders have been facing issues in using the portal.

The Ministry has extended the filing deadline for the third time in less than two months.

Initially, the extension was till May 10 and later the deadline was fixed for June 10.

Giving more time, the Ministry has extended the time limit for making the requisite filings under the companies law to July 10.

“…keeping in view, requests received from various stakeholders, it has been decided to extend the period for which the one time waiver of additional fees is applicable to all e-forms which are due for filing by companies between March 25 to June 30, 2016 as well as extend the last date for filing such documents and availing the benefit of waiver to July 7, 2016,” it said in a communication dated May 31.

While the communication does not mention anything about MCA21, Ministry officials expect to resolve the issues related to the portal soon.

On April 6, an Infosys spokesperson had said it was working with the Ministry to resolve the “minor teething problems” related to MCA21.

The portal is designed to fully automate all processes related to enforcement and compliance of legal requirements under the Companies Act.

Meanwhile, the Ministry has also extended the time limit for submitting Form 11 of LLP in respect of 2015-16 financial year without any additional fees to June 30.

Form 11 is for filing annual returns LLPs.

Source: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/52556624.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

 

Filing tax returns on time has benefits

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With the income tax department allowing ample time for filing returns, many taxpayers take it easy.

For the income earned in the past financial year (FY16), a taxpayer can file returns up to March 2018. However, sticking to the first deadline of July 31 has its benefits.

Say, you make a mistake while filing returns – it can be a wrong computation or incorrect bank account details.

If you file returns on time, the income tax (I-T) department will allow you to revise it as many times as you wish until the end of the assessment year.

In case of belated filing, the taxpayer loses this advantage.

“Not being able to revise returns can lead to problems. For example, in case of wrong computation, the department can send a notice. Incorrect bank account details can delay refunds,” says Vikram Ramchand, founder, Makemyreturns.com.

Missing the first deadline also means that the taxpayer cannot carry forward certain losses.

The Income Tax Act allows individuals to carry forward losses under the ‘capital gains’ head and also business losses for professionals and businesspersons.

These can be adjusted against the future gains for up to eight years.

Due to the correction in stock market in the last financial year, many investors would have suffered a loss in their equity trade.

Filing returns on time can help them utilise these losses in the coming years.

“The only loss that’s allowed to be carry forward for latecomers is the loss from house property,” says Ramchand.

This is the deduction that a person gets on the interest portion of a home loan under Section 24.

Though the deduction can be claimed in the subsequent year, the total limit for deduction will remain Rs 2 lakh for first-time home buyers. In case of a house property that’s not self-occupied, the entire interest can be claimed as deduction.

For those filing belated returns, they will also need to shell out a penalty.

There will be a one per cent penalty every month under Section 234A on the liability if the return is not filed on time, according to Kuldip Kumar, partner and leader (personal tax) at PwC India.

Professionals and businesspersons will also need to pay one per cent penal interest per month under Section 234B, if 90 per cent of the tax is not paid by March 31.

If you don’t file returns at all, there are provisions in the I-T Act that say if the tax due is more than Rs 3,000, the taxpayer can be prosecuted and jailed.

Ramchand says that in his experience, he has also seen that those who file returns on time get faster refunds and their filing is processed quickly, too.

Last year, many taxpayers who filed before the deadline got refunds within a fortnight, according to Ramchand.

However, in case of belated filing, the processing and returns are both delayed – it can easily take six to eight months.

Also, those filing belated returns usually see that their refund amount is adjusted against some pending tax demand of the past, according to tax experts.

Although this is not a rule, tax experts say such cases of adjustments are higher for those filing belated returns.

PwC’s Kumar points out that in the recent Union Budget, the period of filing returns has been reduced from two years to one year.

Taxpayers will need to file returns before the end of the relevant assessment year.

This will apply from the next assessment year.

Therefore, it’s beneficial, one should start filing returns on time to avoid hassles later.

Read Source: Rediff.com