Taxable Event - Supply
- The taxable event for levy of GST shall be ‘supply’ of goods and/ or services. The term ‘supply’ is defined inclusively to cover general supply and deemed supply.
- General supply includes all forms of supply of goods and/or services such as sale, transfer, barter, exchange, license, rental, lease or disposal made for a consideration.
- Deemed supply includes specified transactions made without consideration.
Impact
- Supply of services by CA, CS and CMA for a consideration shall be leviable to GST.
Nature of Supply – Inter-state vs. Intra-state supplies
- Central GST (CGST) and State GST (SGST) will be leviable on intra-State supplies and Integrated GST (IGST) will be leviable on inter-State supplies. IGST will be summation of CGST and SGST.
- Supply of goods and/or services shall be Inter-state if ‘location of supplier’ and ‘place of supply’ are in different States. Otherwise the supply will be Intra-state. ‘Location of supplier’ is generally the registered place of business. ‘Place of Supply’ of services generally is the location of service receiver.
Impact
- Accordingly, if service provider and service receiver are located within a state, the same will be Intra-state supply liable to CGST/SGST. However, if service receiver is located in a different state, the transaction will be Inter-state supply liable to IGST.
Time of Supply and Valuation
- The provisions relating to time of supply and valuation are more or less on the same lines as existing in the current service tax regime.
Impact
- Accordingly, time of supply of services shall be date of invoice or date of receipt of payment, whichever is earlier. In case invoice is not issued within prescribed time, time of supply will shift to the date of completion of service.
- The value of service shall be the price actually paid or payable for supply.
Place Where Tax to be Deposited
- Taxable person is one who carries on business at any place in India and who is liable to be registered. Person is liable to be registered in the State from where supplies are made.
Impact
- Tax is to be deposited in the State from where supply is made by the supplier. There are no clear provisions to determine the place from where supplied are made.
Registration
- Every office of chartered in different state has to take separate registration. There is no concept of centralized registration as of now. Existing taxpayers will be granted registration on provisional basis valid for 6 months.
Input Tax Credit
- Input Tax Credit (ITC) is available in respect of inputs, capital goods and input services. There is a negative list of items on which no ITC is available.
- ITC is available only on provisional basis until the supplier makes the tax payment and files a valid return. There will be matching of supplier and receiver data and credit will be confirmed only after such matching. Where the data is not matched and where the supplier has not made the tax payment, the ITC shall be reversed with interest.
- Interest is from the date of wrong availment or utilization.
Returns
- Professionals like CA, CS and CMA are liable to file GSTR 1 (Statement of outward supplies), GSTR 2 (Statement of inward supplies), GSTR 3 (Statement of final tax and GSTR 8 (Annual return). Further, they may also be required to file GSTR 7 (Statement of TDS).
Payment of Taxes
- Prioritization rule has been inserted for payment of taxes whereby taxes for the current period cannot be paid until the taxes/interest/late-fee/penalty in relation to returns of previous tax periods have not been deposited.
Transitional Provisions
- Amount of CENVAT credit carried forward in a service tax return will be allowed as ITC under GST. However such carry forward is allowed only if the credit is admissible in terms of the ITC provisions of the GST Law. Detailed procedure in this regard will be framed in the Rules to Draft GST Law.
By Tushar Aggarwal & Saurabh Singhal
9911796707
