Ground Reality of GST Amnesty Scheme & Relaxation of Late Fees

Ground Reality of GST Amnesty Scheme & Relaxation of Late Fees as provided under GST in the 43rd GST Council Meeting.

Late Fee Amnesty Scheme for pending returns in FORM GSTR-3B for the tax period of July, 2017 to April, 2021.

The GST Council has notified Amnesty scheme to provide relief and a final opportunity to small taxpayers regarding late fee for pending GSTR 3B from July 2017 to April 2021. This scheme will remain valid from June 1, 2021 to August 31, 2021.

Existing Provision of Late Fee in CGST Act, 2017

Section 47(1) of the CGST Act, 2017 provides for the late fee for filing of returns , including GSTR-4 or GSTR-10, is Rs 100/- per day (each for CGST and SGST) subject to maximum of Rs 5000/-(each for CGST and SGST). Thus total late fee for delay was Rs 200 per day subject to maximum of Rs 10,000/- for each return.

Late Fees as per Amnesty Scheme

Before discussing the pros and cons of this scheme, let’s have a look on another relaxation given by the GST Council in the late fees for the GST Returns after expiration of this scheme.

RATIONALIZATION OF LATE FEE FOR PROSPECTIVE PERIODS: –

To reduce the burden of late fee on smaller taxpayers, the upper cap of late fees is being rationalized to align the late fee with the tax liability/turnover of the taxpayers on a prospective basis. Accordingly, the late fee for delay in furnishing of various returns has been capped as follows: –

For instance:

1. XYZ Enterprises registered under GST on 01.11.2020 and having some business in November 2020 but having no business transaction since 01.12.2020 and he also failed to file the GST Returns since April 2020. Now, they wants to file all the pending returns with applicable late fees. Advise them on the applicable late fee for filing the pending returns.

Note: * The rationalization of late fee is applicable only for the Returns of prospective period (i.e., For April 2021 onwards) and there is no clarification issued yet on the applicability of reduced late fee on the returns for previous tax periods for which the GST Amnesty Scheme is applicable.

Accordingly, now the taxpayers who has not filed the returns since there registration can avail the opportunity of filing those pending returns with the reduced burden of late fee. Though this scheme is not in consonance with the existing provisions of GST Act and it is incomplete in itself in so many ways and few of them are:-

1. The ITC under Section 16(4) of CGST Act, 2017 is time barred and the time limit for claiming the ITC for the tax period July 2017 to March 2020 is expired. Accordingly, the taxpayer cannot claim the ITC for the period of July 2017 to March 2020 in any case as there is no such amendments or relaxations given in the provision of ITC.

2. Further, in this amnesty scheme, Late Fees is relaxed only on the filing of GSTR-3B and the Late Fees on GSTR-1 is still applicable.

3. The taxpayers having A.A.T.O. more than ₹ 5 Cr should file their pending returns within the date of this scheme as they will not get any benefit thereafter as the rationalization of late fee is not applicable on the businesses having A.A.T.O. of more than ₹ 5 Cr.

4. There is no refund/adjustment for the pending returns already filed with applicable late fees till date.

Author Remarks:-

Though it seems beneficial to the taxpayers who have not filed their returns and who wants to keep themselves complied with the requirements of law and to avoid any consequences of not filing the returns within due dates. But it doesn’t seem beneficial to the taxpayers having any tax liability and an ITC on purchases to be availed as they are already restricted under the provision of GST to avail the ITC beyond specified period and if they file the returns after availing this scheme, then they will be definitely face some other repercussion under the GST provision such as:-

• Non-Compliance of Section 16(4) of the CGST Act, 2017,
• Mismatch in the ITC claimed : Non-availability of ITC to Buyer due to non-filing of GSTR 1 by the Supplier,
• If there is any mistake in the Invoices furnished in GSTR 1 for the period of July 2017 to March 2020, that can not be amended now due to Section 37 (3) of CGST Act, 2017,
• and other related issues.

So, the GST Amnesty Scheme is magnificent from outside but when you dig it deep down, the actual reality comes forward as we discussed in this article and as per our remarks, this scheme needs to be more favorable for the taxpayers to actually give any benefit during this harsh time of pandemic and recession.

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