It is a tax on goods and services with value addition at each stage having comprehensive and continuous chain of set-of benefits from the producer’s/service provider’s point up to the retailer’s level where only the final consumer should bear the tax.

GST has become a reality and has eased the fact of doing business a major transformation in the Indian economy. it will ensure a smooth execution of businesses and simplify it in a way they are prepared for the roll out of the uniform indirect tax regime.

The earlier tax system involved multiple taxes, complex compliance procedures, and intervention by several State and Central tax divisions. Doing Business was never easy in India, but with the onset of the GST regime, starting up with a new business is much easier and now instead of applying taxes on the total value of the product at each stage, the GST imposes tax on value addition. Moreover, the new tax system also provides credit for the input tax paid at each previous stage of a supply chain, this method considerably reduces the overall cost of manufacturing and selling goods.

By Getting registered under GST law you obtain a unique number ( GSTIN) from the concerned tax authorities and are entitled to collect tax on behalf of government and avail Input tax credit.

But it is very important to understand who needs to register, how he will get himself registered and what is the eligibility criteria for getting registered.

Registration for Existing taxpayers Any existing business who is registered under service tax or has VAT registration can register themselves on GST Portal.

Basic requirement for Registration

• Provisional ID
• PAN No of the tax payer/business
• Mobile number
• Email id
• Bank account details

  
  

Today more than 1 crore taxpayer have got themselves registered and majority of the VAT businesses have been migrated to GST. The Government is expecting the figure to cross 2 crore mark in a years time.

Eligibility criteria for Registration Procedure

• Any person who is doing business in trading of goods or services has to register for GST.
• Rs. 10 lakhs for businesses in any state of North-East India I.e. Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, J&K, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Manipur, Mizoram, Sikkim, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura and for other states if the business annual turnover exceeds Rs. 20 lakhs or more).
• Any person who has multiple business verticals in a State will need to obtain a separate registration for each business vertical.

  
  

Documents for GST registrationThe documents required for GST registration are as follows.

• Rent agreement or electricity bill for place of business.
• PAN card of the Company
• Cancelled cheque of the bank account showing account holders, MICR code, IFSC code and bank branch details.
• Proof of constitution like partnership deed, Memorandum of Association (MOA) /Articles of Association (AOA), certificate of incorporation.
• List of directors with their identity and address proof in case of company.
• List of partners with their identity and address proof in case of partnership firm.

  
  

Cases where Registration is compulsory irrespective of Threshold Limit

• Inter State Suppliers
• Person receiving supplies on which tax is payable by recipient on reverse charge basis
• Casual taxable person who is not having fixed place for business in State or Union territories
• On resident taxable person who do not have fixed place of business in India

  
  

Standardization Procedure

• An application needs to be submitted online through the common portal within 30 days from the date when liability to register arose.
• For the casual and non resident taxable persons need to apply atleast 5 days prior to commencement of business.

  
  

Checking Approval Status of Application You can track the status of your GST application by logging on www.gst.gov.in and scroll down to the bottom of the page and click the registration status. The status of the application can be checked by entering the registration Number, provisional ID or your pan number.

The aim of composition scheme is to bring simplicity and to reduce the compliance cost for the small taxpayers. Every tax system prescribes several actions which need to be taken by businesses to ensure compliance with statutory provisions. Things like periodic payment of taxes, filing timely returns and maintaining prescribed records are necessary steps in a tax system for corporate taxpayers. However, small business owners find it overwhelmingly challenging to deal with such requirements of the law due to lack of knowledge and expertise

To make compliance easier for small businesses, many state governments have provisions in their VAT system for payment of a composition levy by small businesses. This ensures greater compliance without the need for maintaining copious records. Although such a system is missing in Service Tax laws.

The One Nation One Tax Scheme (GST) which promises to club all the indirect taxes into one also boasts a composition scheme for small businesses. The GST Composition Scheme will make compliance with tax laws hassle free for eligible businesses opting for the scheme.

Here are some key features of the scheme:

Eligibility - Not everyone is eligible to enrol under this scheme. It is meant for taxpayers whose aggregate turnover does not exceed Rs. 75 lakh threshold in a Financial Year.

Tax rate - Rate of tax as prescribed will be less than regular GST but not less than 1% of the turnover during the Financial Year. Tax rates under the scheme are expected to be between 1% and 3%.

Not eligible for Input Tax Credit – As per section 16, those goods and services on which Composition Tax has been paid (under section 8) do not qualify for Input Tax Credit.

Applies to Intra-state supplies – Local suppliers, i.e., those who supply within a state can only take advantage of this scheme. Inter-state suppliers will come under regular GST laws.

Needs voluntary application – Taxpayers need to make voluntary registration every year for getting the benefits of GST Composition Scheme. However, if the taxpayer crosses the minimum turnover limit of Rs. 75 lakh then he will be transferred to regular scheme. Taxpayers who are already a part of VAT Composition Scheme also need to voluntarily register for this scheme.

Quarterly returns – Instead of filing 3-4 returns monthly, taxpayers registered under this scheme will be required to file returns once every quarter.

Bill of supply not tax invoice – Unlike regular scheme where a taxpayer needs to present tax invoice to the tax authorities, taxpayers registered under this scheme need to present bill of supply.

Penalty – If a taxable person is found not eligible for this scheme then the tax authorities can impose a penalty equal to the amount of tax on such person along with his tax liability. So, utmost care needs to be taken when opting for this scheme and paying taxes.

A Return could be defined as a detailed document/statement containing the income which a taxpayer is required to file and could be further used by the tax authorities in calculation of the tax liability. Any registered taxpayer has to file GST returns which includes: Purchases, Sales, Output GST (On sales), Input tax credit (GST paid on purchases), etc. Before filing the return, payment of tax due is compulsory otherwise such return will be invalid.

GSTR1 GSTR-1 is meant for outward supplies/sales or services i.e. the summary would be generated or the user can view the tax details for whatever sales that has been done.The GSTR1 is not applicable to composition vendors, non resident foreign taxpayers and those with an Unique Identification Number. Dates for filing GSTR-1 : The GSTR-1 return for a month can be filed between 1st and 10th of the following month. For example For filing the GSTR-1 for Feb 2018, you can file it on any day between 1st and 10th of March 2018.

GSTR-2 GSTR 2 is meant for inward supplies or purchases i.e. the summary would be generated or the user can view the tax details for whatever purchases that has been done. All the purchases made from a registered vendor, the information from their sales returns (GSTR-1) will be available in the GSTN portal as GSTR-2A for you to use in your GSTR-2. Before you file your return, you can check this information, make changes if necessary, and add any details that were not auto-populated.

GSTR3: The GSTR-3 is a document which contains the details of all the transactions during the month, including purchases, sales, and interstate movement of stock for a particular month. The GSTR3 is auto-generated based on the information available inside the GSTR-1 and GSTR-2 that have been filed for the same tax period. All the registered tax payers under the GST who have either opted for the composition scheme or have a Unique Identification Number (UIN). This return is also not applicable to non-resident tax payers.

GSTR- 3B GSTR-3B is a simple provisional tax return form introduced by the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC)/GST Council only for the month of July and August. In simple terms, GSTR-3B is a temporary and simplified government return form which is being introduced and will be used by the taxable person who is registered as regular dealers. This form will be used for the purpose of filing returns only for the month of July and August 2017 in lieu of the normal returns. GSTR-3B was a step to ease the return filing process for the first two months ( July & August) so that businesses can adapt to the changes brought in by the implementation of GST in a radial manner. Since a lot of small and medium businesses were using manual accounting methods, filing returns within the July 2017 deadlines was difficult for many of these businesses and therefore GSTR3B concept came into existence for the months of July to December 2017, so that it provides time to the businesses to understand and make themselves ready for filing the more complex GSTR 1, 2 and 3 returns.

GSTR 4 GSTR-4 is filed once every 3 months by a registered tax payers who has opted for the composition scheme (they are known as composition vendors). It contains the total value of the sales and supplies made, the tax paid at compounding rate, and invoice-level details of purchases the composition vendor made from other registered tax payers during the tax period. GST Returns for those tax payers who falls under Composition Scheme and the turnover is less than 1.5 crore. Marg ERP has simplified the whole process of generating GSTR 4 for their users.

The earlier taxation system was unable to collect service tax from various unorganized sectors like goods, transport etc.

Time of Supply The time of supply is the point when supply is liable to GST. In reverse charge, the recipient is liable to pay GST and thus time of supplies under reverse charge is different from the supplies which are under forward charge. During supply of goods the time of supply is earliest of

• Date of receipts of goods
• Date of bank as per book of payments or date of debit
• Date immediately following 30 days from the date of issue of invoice

For example: If the goods are received on 18 th Feb2017 ,the date of payment was 18 th Feb 2017, date of invoice is 2nd March 2017 and the date of entry in the book of recipient is 20 th Feb 2017. In such a condition , Time of supply will be considered as 20th Feb 2017 and if the supply date could not be determined it will be considered as 20 th Feb 2017, i.e. Date of entry.

Services Under reverse Charge

• Goods transport agencies providing services to any factory, society, co-operative society, body corporate.
• Legal services by any advocate to any business entity located in the taxable territory.
• Service supplied by any insurance agent to any person carrying business, located in the taxable territory.
• Services supplied by a recovery agent to a banking company or a financial institution
• Supply of services by an author or music composer, photographer located in the taxable territory

  
  

In case of supply of services, time of supply is earliest of

• Date of payments as per books of account or date of debit in bank account
• Date immediately following sixty days from the date of issue.

For all the businesses which are GST registered they need to provide GST-complaint invoices to their clients for sale of goods and/or services. All the GST registered vendors provide GST-compliant purchase invoices to you.

Mandatory fields under GST invoice The GST invoice is issued to charge the tax and pass on the input tax credit. Some of the mandatory fields under GST invoice are

• Invoice number and date
• Customer name
• Shipping and billing address
• taxpayer’s GSTIN
• Place of supply
• HSN/ SAC code
• Item details i.e. Quantity (number), unit (metre, kg etc.) and total value
• The Taxable value and discounts
• Rate and amount of taxes i.e. CGST/ SGST/ IGST
• Whether GST is payable on reverse charge basis
• Signature of the supplier

Time Limits to issue GST tax invoice There is a specific time limit to issue GST tax invoices, revised bills, debit note and credit note. The due dates for issuing an invoice for goods in normal case is on or before date of removal of delivery. And in case of continuous supply of goods it is on or before the date of issue of account statement. The Time limit in case of normal services is within 30 days of supply of services.

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