Understand GSTR 1 filing and added features in return utilities with Q & A

Understand GSTR 1 filing and added features in return utilities with Q & A

Question and answers in GSTR 1 filing in GST portal – how to understand it and what are the added features in return utilities on GST Portal that would bring relief for tax payers :

The GST Council took a slew of decisions during its 23rd meeting in Guwahati to benefit consumers and businesses alike. While consumers will stand to benefit from a number of rate cuts, including the tax on restaurants, businesses stand to benefit from a significant easing of compliance norms to do with filing returns.

 

So what has changed with the forms and how is it going to ease the burden of tax payers

Originally upto 15th Nov 2017

v  GST system required businesses to submit at least three forms to file their returns. v  The GSTR-1 dealt with the invoice-wise details of supply, GSTR-2 dealt with the receipts of goods, and GSTR-3 an overall summary derived from GSTR 1 Form and GSTR 2 respectively .

Decisions taken in 23rd GST Council Meeting

v  GST Council decided to ease the compliance burden on businesses, companies would be allowed to only file the GSTR-1 form, up to March 31, 2018 and there by negating the requirement of filing other two forms GSTR2 and GSTR-3 which will be filed as scheduled in the original drafting of law from April 18. v  GST Council organized a committee to look into how to make the GSTR-2 Form easier, to bring it back into the system with full functionality. v  The Council also decided to extend the usage of the summary GSTR-3B form, meant to make life easier for those unfamiliar with the filing process, till March 31 from the earlier December 31 deadline.

Changes in deadlines for GST Return filing and how the GST Council has divided the Tax payers into two slots providing the tax payers the burden less smooth filing of GST Returns as they promised :

Seeing the difficulties faced by small and medium sized enterprises the council then decided to divide the tax payers into two groups based on turnover filed by the tax payers in the previous financial year. Let’s see how this has been worked out and whether this really going to benefit tax payers especially SME’s and let’s also look at the same time how these decisions are being reflected in the GST Return utilities on GST Portal.

I. Class A or Group A Tax Payers (for convenience of understanding) :

♦ Who are these tax payers : These are tax payers – Companies, Partnership firms, Limited liability Partnership companies, sole proprietorship firms with a turnover of up to ₹1.5 crore in the preceeding financial year.

So if your turnover in the preceeding financial year following the Action period (i.e., GST Period 01.07.2017) is within the said prescribed limit of 1.5 Crores then you fall in this group.

♦ What are the benefits given here for them : To file their GSTR-1 forms for each month in a quarterly manner. Since GSTR2 and GSTR3 utility filing has not been finalized the work for which is under process the manner of filing these Forms (GSTR-2 and GSTR 3) will be notified on later date in future. So overall it’s a relief for small traders whose turnover is well within the said limit requiring to file GSTR-1 Form on quarterly basis and there by not requiring to file returns on monthly basis. [Note : The Taxes have to be paid on monthly basis by filing Form GSTR 3B which has to be filed by all tax payers irrespective of the turnover till March 2018]

♦ New GST dates to remember if you have opted for Quarterly return : GSTR-1 Form for July to September are to now be filed by December 31, the October to December forms by February 15, 2018 and the January to March forms by April 30, 2018.

♦ How to choose this plan on GST Portal : Logging onto GST Portal from 10th of this Month has been different we saw following questions that creeped up the ladder while filing the GSTR 3B return lets understand these in details. Logging onto GST Portal the new pop up page would look something like this.

Finer Points here :

Please select the last month of the Quarter?? How to understand this :

l  July month’s GSTR-1 return has already been filed by us during September 2017 and hence for the Quarter July – September GSTR 1 for August and September alone needs to be filed by selecting the last month of the Quarter (September in this case)

l  Do we need to fill up separate GSTR-1 for each of the month of the Quarter?? No the GSTR 1 Form is one for all months of the Quarter. So you would be required to file one GSTR-1 Form for the whole Quarter.

 

♦ Is there any Changes in GSTR 1 Form then?? Yes few headings been added…

GSTR1 Form – Other Details : These are the details in excess of Original GSTR 1 Form which we used for filing July’s GSTR 1 filing and the other particulars of GSTR1 are kept intact.

Table 11A Amended Tax Liability (Advance Received) Table 11B Amendment of Adjustment of Advances Table-10 Amendment B2C (Others)

Each table requires furnishing of Consolidated Statement of Advances Received/Advances which were adjusted in the current tax period/ Amendments of information which were furnished in earlier tax period.

II. Class A or Group A Tax Payers (for convenience of understanding) :

♦ Who are these tax payers : These are tax payers – Companies, Partnership firms, Limited liability Partnership companies, sole proprietorship firms with a turnover exceeding ₹1.5 crore in the preceeding financial year.

So if your turnover in the preceeding financial year exceeds 1.5 Crores then you fall in this group.

♦ New GST dates to remember if you have opted for Monthly return : To File their July to October forms by December 31. And from thereafter, they will have to file monthly returns, but with a delay of 40 days from the end of the taxable period. That is, the returns for November will have to be filed by January 10, those for December by February 10, and so on. The extension period of 40 days for each month’s return is given in order to match the return filing period of those who would be filing the returns on Quarterly basis because GSTs matching concept cannot be compromised and hence the delay is allowed in returns for those who will be opting for monthly returns.

♦ How to choose this plan on GST Portal : The page will open similar to the diagram above. In order to select monthly return you have to click ‘No’ instead of ‘Yes’. And there is no further change in GSTR 1 Form, the GSTR1 Form is one for all tax payers irrespective of the turnover criteria. [Note : Again the Taxes have to be paid on monthly basis by filing Form GSTR 3B which has to be filed by all tax payers irrespective of the turnover till March 2018]

 

Conclusion : Still we are waiting for GSTN to work to its fullest as GSTR2 filing and GSTR-3 filing utility are yet to be put up on GST Portal. It’s clear from these changes brought up by GST Council that they are clear in presenting the true picture of GST to Tax payers and they are seriously working on clearing the issues related to GSTN and its implementation. As a tax payer everyone would expect the same from the law makers to repair and re structure the GST to suit the needs of various tax payers so that GST return filing is not considered as a burden by tax payers anymore. And Tally.ERP 9 has a like mind when it comes to embrace the changes or adapting the changed environment as it states to deliver the packed GST just as it is originated from GST Network. And the experience of filing GST returns from Tally.ERP 9 is way more easier than filing with offline utility tool on GST Portal as in offline utility tool either you would be required to fill all particulars about outward supplies manually or through a automated software which are very few in the market. But with Tally.ERP 9 you can directly export the data into JSON format then into the GST portal. Thus making the process of return filing a easier task. But the transformation part of Tally.ERP 9 comes with its innovative ideas which one would have witnessed recently with its online forums which has received wide interest from Chartered accountants community as it allows them to seek to share to depart knowledge on various topics concerning GST and this is such a good initiative considering that the new India to be build in the back drop of GST and that would be possible only when people with knowledge shares what they know about GST and Tally.ERP 9 is one such medium which is educating and bridging this knowledge gap.

How To File GSTR-1

How To File GSTR-1

GSTR-1 prescribes the details to be provided by the taxpayer in relation to Outward supplies made to the buyer for the relevant period. GSTR-1 needs to be filed by every taxpayer except Compsition Scheme taxpayers, Non-Resident Foreign taxpayers, TDS deductors, E-commerce Operators and Input Servise Distributors as there are separate returns for them. This return is required to be filed by the 10th of subsequent month. (Example: GSTR-1 for the transaction month of April has to be filed before 10th May).

The government has notified new GST Return formats in this regard and removed the mandatory requirement to quote HSN codes for goods and SAC codes for services in each table. The GST Return Formats have been updated to ease the process and simplify compliance for taxpayers under GST.

The GST Council in its meeting on July 2-3 had shared a revised format for returns which are required to be filed under the GST regime.

GSTR-1 has a total of 13 headings. However, the taxable person need not worry as most of these will be prefilled. Before we dive deep into the various sections of this return, we need to understand certain terms. These are:

1. GSTIN – Goods and Services Taxpayer Identification Number
2. UID – Unique Identity Number for Embassies
3. HSN – Harmonized System of Nomenclature for goods
4. SAC – Services Accounting Code
5. GDI – Government Department Unique ID where department does not have a GSTIN
6. POS – Place of Supply of Goods or Services – State Code to be mentioned.

Below are the various section headings under GSTR-1:

1. GSTIN: Each taxpayer will be allotted a state-wise PAN-based 15-digit Goods and Services Taxpayer Identification Number (GSTIN). The format of proposed GSTIN has been shown in the image below. The GSTIN of the taxpayer will be auto-populated at the time of return filing.

• Name of the taxpayer: Name of the taxpayer will also be auto-populated at the time of logging into the common GST Portal.

• Gross turnover of the taxpayer in the previous FY: This information is required to be filed only in the first year of GST implementation. Next year onwards it will be auto-populated as carried forward balance of the previous year.

• Taxable outward supplies made to registered persons (including UIN-holders) other than supplies covered by Table 6: This head will hold the information about the details of all taxable supplies made by the registered taxable person. This head will cover complete details of Normal Taxable Supplies,  Supplies under Reverse Charge, and Supplies by way of an E-Commerce operator.

• Taxable outward inter-state supplies to unregistered persons where the invoice value is more than Rs 2.5 lakh: This head will cover the details of all taxable supplies made to an unregistered person in the different state. However, details are needed to be furnished only when the turnover exceeds Rs. 2.5 lakh.

• Zero-rated supplies and deemed exports: All type of zero-rated supplies, exports, deemed exports (supply to SEZ, EOUs) will be captured under this head.

• Taxable supplies (net of debit notes and credit notes) to unregistered persons other than the supplies covered in Table 5: All the taxable supply which are made to an unregistered taxable person and are not covered under table 5 needs to be furnished under this head. This will mainly cover taxable supplies to the unregistered person in the same state and below Rs. 2.5 lakh in other states.

• Nil-rated, exempt and non-GST outward supplies: All the other supplies whether nil rated, exempt or non-GST which has not been reported under any of the above needs to be reported under this head.

• Amendments to taxable outward supply details furnished in returns for earlier tax periods in Table 4, 5 and 6 [including debit notes, credit notes, refund vouchers issued during the current period and amendments thereof: Details of any kind of amendment in outward supply from previous tax period needs to be reported under this head. Any amendment in debit or credit notes also needs to be provided under this head.

• Amendments to taxable outward supplies to unregistered persons: Any amendment in details of taxable outward supplies to unregistered persons from previous tax periods needs to be made under this head.

• Consolidated statement of advances received/advance: This head will include all the details of advances received and adjusted under the current period. This will result in increase/decrease of GST liability. Any kind of amendment in advances from earlier tax period also needs to be reported here.

• HSN-wise summary of outward supplies: Here the taxable person will consolidate all his supplies across HSN codes. This section will also reflect high-level information on supplies made and IGST, CGST and SGST collected against it.

• Documents issued during the tax period: This head will include details of all invoices issues in a tax period, any kind of revised invoice, debit notes, credit notes etc.