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The facility to file GSTR 3B and GSTR-1 with the EVC in lieu of DSC extended to the registered person, who are also registered under the Companies Act, 2013, shall be withdrawn w.e.f. 1st Nov. 2020.  However, facility to file NIL returns through OTP verification, shall be continued for all types of registered persons in view of notification 58/2020- dated 1st July 2020. Source: www.gst.gov.in Disclaimer: TaxAvant is meant purely for the educational purpose of Tax Laws and Regulatory Updates. It contains only general information. It is not professional advice and should not be treated as such. This Blog should not be substituted for professional advice. For Specific Queries, please post in the comments section.

In terms of Rule 138 E (b) of the CGST Rules, 2017, the E Way Bill generation facility of a person is liable to be restricted, in case the person fails to file their GSTR-3B returns, for a consecutive period of two months or more. As you might be aware that the GST Council in its last meeting has decided that this provision will be made applicable for the taxpayers whose Aggregate Annual Turn Over (AATO, PAN based) is more than Rs 5 Crores.   Thus, if the GSTIN associated with the respective PAN (with AATO over Rs 5 Cr.) has failed to file their GSTR-3B Return for 02 or more tax periods, up to the month of tax period of  August, 2020, their EWB generation facility will be blocked on the EWB Portal.  Please note that the EWB generation facility for such GSTINs (whether as consignor or consignee or by transporter) will be blocked on EWB Portal after 15th October, 2020. To avail continuous EWB generation facility on EWB Portal, Taxpayers are therefore advised to file yo...

The 42nd GST Council met under the Chairmanship of Union Finance & Corporate Affairs Minister Smt Nirmala Sitharaman through video conferencing on 5th October 2020. The meeting was also attended by Union Minister of State for Finance & Corporate Affairs besides Finance Ministers of States & UTs and senior officers of the Ministry of Finance & States/ UTs. The GST Council has made the following recommendations: 1. Levy of Compensation Cess to be extended beyond the transition period of five years i.e. beyond June, 2022, for such period as may be required to meet the revenue gap. Further details to be worked out. 2. Centre is releasing compensation of ₹ 20,000 crore to States today towards loss of revenue during 2020-21 and an amount of about ₹ 25,000 crore towards IGST of 2017-18 by next week. 3. Enhancement in features of return filing:In its 39th Meeting held in March 2020, the Council had recommended an incremental approach to incorporate features of the new return sy...

‘E-Invoicing’ for certain classes of taxpayers has come into effect from 1-10-2020. Keeping in view the hardships faced by the taxpayers due to COVID-19 lockdown and as some of these taxpayers are still not ready, as a last chance, Government had given relaxation that invoices raised by notified taxpayers during October, 2020 without following e-invoice procedure (i.e. uploading invoice details on e-invoice portal (IRP), obtaining IRN and issuing invoice with QR Code) will be deemed to be valid and no penalty will be there if the IRN for such invoices is obtained within 30 days of date of invoice. Further, vide notifications (Central Tax) 70/2020 and 72/2020 dated 30-9-2020, certain amendments and additions were made in respect of e-invoicing. Below is the summary of amendments: Regarding aggregate turnover threshold, it was specified that those who crossed Rs. 500 Cr. in any preceding financial year from 2017-18 onwards, will be covered. Supplies for ‘exports’ are also specifically i...

The GSTN Portal has now done away with the mandatory requirement of linking of credit notes with Invoices Nos. issued by the Supplier while filing of GSTR-1, GSTR-6 or Filing of Refunds. Till now, original invoice number was mandatorily required to be quoted by the taxpayers, while reporting a Credit Note or Debit Note in Form GSTR-1 or Form GSTR-6. The taxpayers have now been provided with a facility on the GST Portal to: Report in their Form GSTR-1 or in Form GSTR-6, single credit note or debit note issued in respect of multiple invoices Choose the note supply type as Regular, SEZ, DE, Export etc., to identify the table to which such credit note or debit note pertains Indicate Place of Supply (POS) against each credit note or debit note, to identify the supply type i.e. Intra-State or Inter-State Debit /Credit Notes can be declared with tax amount, but without any taxable value also i.e. if credit note or debit note is issued for difference in tax rate only, then note value can be re...

A PDF statement has been made available to taxpayers, filing monthly GSTR-1 statement, with system computed values of Table 3 of Form GSTR-3B. This PDF will be prepared on the basis of the values reported by them, in their GSTR-1 statement, for the said tax period. Note: This facility will also be provided to quarterly GSTR-1 filers in due course of time. This PDF will be available on their GSTR-3B dashboard, from tax period of August 2020 onwards, containing the information of GSTR-1 filed by them on or after 4th September 2020. This will make filing of their Form GSTR-3B easier for them. This facility is provided to all taxpayers registered as a Normal taxpayer, SEZ Developer, SEZ unit and casual taxpayer. Tables of Form GSTR 3B will be Auto-Drafted in PDF statement : Following Tables of Form GSTR-3B will be auto drafted, on basis of values reported in GSTR-1 statement, for the said period: 3.1(a) - Outward taxable supplies (other than zero rated, nil rated and exempted) 3.1(b) - Ou...

The Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs (CBIC) has recently enabled new functionalities for Taxpayers liable to file GSTR-8 as well as for Composition Taxpayers effecting supplies through E-Commerce Operators in the wake of Covid-19.These Changes aims at easing the process of furnishing of Return under Form GSTR-8 by the E-Commerce Operators.Detailed Explanation of the Changes is as follows: Provision to make amendment, multiple times, in Table 4 of Form GSTR-8 Earlier, if no action was taken on TCS details, auto-populated in TDS/TCS credit form, by the supplier or if the same were rejected by them in the said form, the TCS (e-commerce operators) could amend the details only once. Based on requests received from stakeholders, the restriction of amending the transaction details only once, in the table 4 (i.e. amendment table) of Form GSTR-8, has now been removed. Thus, details of table 4 (i.e. amendment table) of Form GSTR-8, can now be amended multiple times, by e-commerce op...

Covid-19 Pandemic is being dubbed as the worst disaster of this century so far which has resulted in forced lock down measures across the globe. Every business sector barring few have been affected by this Pandemic causing a serious dent in their cash flows and profits. In India, Central Government forced the nationwide lock down on 24th March. However,various relief to businesses were announced by government as part of their AatmaNirbhar (Self-Reliant) Bharat (India). On similar lines, CBIC (Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs) has announced relief measures pertaining to GST law and compliance to help businesses. These relief measures range from Relaxations & Extensions in Return Filing as well as regarding applicability of certain provisions under GST Law.This article covers all such measures in detail. Relaxations & Extensions given in Filing Dates of GSTR-3B (Notification No.54/2020-CT dated 24th June 2020) For Taxpayers having Aggregate Turnover > Rs.5 Cr in ...

Ministry of Finance(MoF) vide its Press Release dated 15th July 2020 issued " Clarification on the issue of GST Rate on Alcohol-based Hand Sanitizers ". This Clarification seeks to declutter the issues surrounding the Alcohol-Based Hand Sanitizers since many representations were made to MoF seeking exemption from GST for the Hand Sanitizers on account of them being essential goods in the times of Covid-19 Pandemic. This Clarification has finally put to rest the misinformation about the applicability and rate of GST for Hand Sanitizers.A Recent AAR Ruling  issued on 29th June 2020 by Goa Authority for Advance Ruling prescribed a rate of 18% for Alcohol-Based Hand Sanitizers by categorizing them under HSN Code 3808. However, the limitation of the applicability of AAR Ruling still made the issue unresolved within the Industry. Thus, with this clarification, MoF has made it clear that hand sanitizers shall attract the rate of 18% under GST. It also clarified that Inputs for manu...

The Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs( CBIC ) has issued a clarification on 10th June 2020 in respect of the issues relating to refund of accumulated Input Tax Credit( ITC ) in respect of Invoices whose details are not reflected in the FORM GSTR-2A. CBIC vide circulars no.125/44/2019-GST dated 18th November 2019 held that ITC in respect of invoices not reflected in FORM GSTR-2A was admissible and copies of such invoices were required to be uploaded. However, Notification no.49/2019-CT dated 9th October 2019 inserted a rule 36(4)  and restricted the claim of provisional ITC to the extent of 20% of the eligible credit available in FORM GSTR-2A, due to which field officers were apprehensive of the claim of refund of ITC of invoices which were not reflected in FORM GSTR-2A. For E.g., The said notification stated that if a company has invoices of ITC amounting to Rs.100 and its GSTR-2A reflects the balance of Rs.80 then the company could claim ITC worth Rs.96 (120% of Rs.80....

The Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs(CBIC) issued Clarification vide  Circular No.140/10/2020-GST  on June 10,2020 putting an end to the huge commotion generated by the contrary rulings of various Advance Ruling Authorities(AAR) on the applicability of GST on Remuneration paid to Directors of a Company. Various Doubts were posed as to whether the GST is leviable on Director's Remuneration paid by companies to their Directors falls under the ambit of entry in Schedule III of Central Goods and Services Tax Act,2017 (CGST Act) i.e.  "services by an employee to the employer in the course of or in relation to his employment"  or whether the same is liable to be taxed in terms of notification no.13/2017-Central Tax(Rate) dated 28th June 2017(entry no.6). The issue of remuneration to directors has been examined under the following two different categories: i) Leviability of GST on remuneration paid by companies to the independent directors defined in section 14...