Govt says GSTN portal working fine as tax consultants list glitches

Industry associations seek extension of deadline to file annual returns.

The government on Tuesday said the GSTN portal is working well as tax consultants complained their clients face difficulties in uploading annual returns for 2020-21 before the deadline ends December 31.

Government sources said a good number of returns were filed in the past four days and any taxpayer who faced difficulties were assisted for the process.

Some tax consultants said their clients are not able to file the annual GST returns--GSTR 9 and 9C--others said they faced glitches intermittently for the last three days.

"My team is not able to upload the returns," said Rajat Mohan, senior partner at AMRG & Associates.

The GSTR 9 is the form for annual return of consolidated figures and updation, of what was filed in GSTR1 and GSTR 3B. GSTR 9C is reconciliation of GSTR returns with companies' books of accounts.

The government gives companies six more months to file monthly and quarterly returns--GSTR1 and GSTR 3B--when the year ends. So, these returns for 2020-21 could be filed until September 2021. Companies with annual turnover of Rs 5 crore have to file these returns monthly, those with annual return up to Rs five crore can file them quarterly if they choose so.

Annual return -- GSTR 9-- consolidate these returns filed till September 2021.

Harpreet Singh, partner at KPMG, said there have been some issues on the portal during the last few days. "For example the portal is slow in responding to the submissions and also the saved figures are not appearing," he said.

Pratik Jain, partner indirect taxes at PwC, said earlier that saved figures are not appearing on GSTN in some cases.

"It is happening intermittently. In some cases, issues are cropping up for the last three days. However, some returns are getting filed. For the last three days, portal functioning has not been smooth," he said.

Industry associations have asked for extending the deadline of filing annual GST returns.

Singh said extension, granted now may give time to the industry to do their reconciliations but they may not serve the intended purpose as it may be too late in the day to give the desired respite from the annual compliance.