Call for better ease of doing business in paying taxes through portal
Shoma Patnaik
Panaji : With GST completing eight years on Monday, Goa’s taxation experts have said they are looking forward to fewer tax slabs from the GST Council this year as well as lowering the highest tax rate of 28 per cent.
The state’s construction and hospitality sectors are expected to benefit from merging of the tax slabs and the simplification of the tax process.
Chartered accountants in the state emphasised the need for better ease of doing business (EoDB) in paying taxes through the GST portal. The portal has improved, but it is not seamless and faces glitches, according to CAs.
“The GST Amnesty scheme ended on June 30, but until the first week of June the portal was not working. Assessees got only three weeks to avail of the scheme. The GST office made alternate arrangements, but the portal could have been made more robust. It would have also improved the amnesty compliance,” said a CA.
Parimal Kulkarni of the GST grievance redressal committee, Goa, pointed out that data compilation by the GST office needs streamlining.
“Presently notices are issued to tax filers when the department realises that the business entity has claimed input tax credit and the supplier has not filed returns. The department needs to work on a system to detect non-filers. Instead of approaching taxpayers for their suppliers who have not paid tax more effort is needed to trace non-filers or late filers of GST,” Kulkarni said.
He said the state has many cases of disputed GST which need resolving.
GST, the unified tax was launched in July 1, 2017, and completed eight years on June 30. In the ninth year, tax experts said they want the compensation cess to be stopped. The cess was supposed to be for five years but has continued till date.
GCCI’s taxation committee chairman Rohan Bhandari pointed out that “the GST Tribunal for settling disputed cases and claims must start functioning. EoDB for MSMEs paying tax is another issue.”
From July 1, the GST portal will permanently block the filing of any return that is more than three years overdue. No returns can henceforth be filed on the portal after the expiry of three years.
Goa’s GST collection was Rs 6,496 crore in 2023-24. The state has total 21,000 tax payers as on July 1 2024.
