Last date for filing GSTR-2, GSTR-3 extended by a month

The last date for filing of GSTR-1 for July was October 1. Over 46.54 lakh businesses had filed July GSTR-1 returns.

This (The extension) will facilitate about 30.81 lakh taxpayers for filing GSTR-2 for the month of July, 2017, the finance ministry said in a statement.

“The competent authority has approved the extension of filing of GSTR-2 for July, 2017 to November, 2017, for facilitation of businesses and all taxpayers,” it said. This is the first month of filing GSTR-2. Businesses have been complaining of problems in matching invoices, while filing GSTR-2 on the GST Network (GSTN) portal.

The extension of the last date for filing will act as a breather for them as well as GSTN which can further streamline the utilities on the portal.

The Group of Minister under Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi had last week flagged issues faced by taxpayers in filing GSTR-2 and asked Infosys and GST Network to streamline the system.

Till Saturday, about 12 lakh businesses had filed GSTR-2 returns for the month of July.

Meanwhile, according to a PTI report, Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) Chairperson Vanaja N Sarna on Monday said that tax collections under the new GST regime are more or less in line with the projections and there are no plans yet to revise the annual revenue targets.

Sarna said the target for revenue for the Department of Customs is about Rs 9.68 lakh crore for the current fiscal.

Customs collection growth is “alright”, she said, adding that the GST roll out from July 1 has been relatively smooth.

“The roll out has been relatively smooth and collections are more or less coming in line,” she was quoted by PTI as saying, adding that it is very difficult to say if the targets of tax collections in the new regime would be met or not.

She was replying to a question if the GST collection target may be missed.

“It is very difficult to say for the GST regime because it is only two-three months down the line,” she said.

The government last week had stated that GST collections for September totalled Rs 92,150 crore. They were over Rs 95,000 crore in July and over Rs 91,000 crore in August. GST, which amalgamates over a dozen taxes, including excise duty and service Tax, was rolled out from July 1. The CBEC chief said that it was difficult to access the target as exporters would take refund and there would be input tax credit refund as well.

“But I think by and large six month down the line is better time to actually gauge what your revenues are going to be,” she said. Asked if there is any talk of revising the revenue targets, she said: “At the moment there is no thinking because GST has to settle down. So you can only think about revision if you are sure about what you are falling back on. Let the GST roll out little more, then we will take a call.” With PTI