Taxpayers Can Now Check GST History Of Their Suppliers, Says GSTN CEO

Taxpayers can now check if and when suppliers file their Goods and Services Tax returns, helping them choose vendors to ensure input tax credit doesn't get stuck.

The facility, started late February, allows taxpayers to check if a taxpayer is filing returns by entering GST identification number, GST Network Chief Executive Officer Prakash Kumar told BloombergQuint. Once GSTIN of a taxpayer is entered, the database shows status of 10 returns with fields like type of return filed, date of filing, status of returns filed or not and tax period.

Since input credit for taxpayers depends on filing of returns by suppliers, this would also facilitate taking decisions to buy goods or supplies from other businesses, Kumar said.

E-Way Bill Portal Stable

The portal for generating e-way bills for inter-state movement of goods has stabilised with about 8.66 lakh—the highest number of such invoices—being generated on April 4, Kumar said. It is mandatory to generate e-way bills for movement of goods worth over Rs 50,000 between states.

The maximum number of e-way bills generated on an hourly basis so far has been around 92,000, said Kumar.

The government is banking on e-way bills to shore up its revenue from the new indirect regime by curbing evasion. The electronic invoices were rolled out for inter-state trade from April 1.

A mechanism for e-way bills for transporting goods within states is yet to be rolled out. The GST Council had decided to implement it in phases so that it doesn't put excessive load on the system.

Kumar said the GST Council would take a call looking at the current trend of invoices being generated. There is no legacy data to estimate the number of e-way bills that will be generated for movement of goods within states, he said.

Also Read: BQExplains: What Are E-Way Bills And How Do They Work?

In the e-way bill portal, taxpayers have the option to automatically update their GST return with their supplies for which e-way bill has to be generated. Those who do not opt for automatically updating their GSTR-1 returns, their invoices will be matched by GSTN, said Kumar.

According to an official who spoke on the condition of anonymity, GSTN would have a database that would save details of tax paid by taxpayers. It would send alerts if details in returns filed don't match the data in e-way bills, above a certain threshold.

Also Read: More Than 1.7 Lakh E-Way Bills Generated On First Day of Rollout