TMI BlogProcedure for electronic filing of Central Excise and Service Tax returns and for electronic Payment of Central Excise Duty and Service TaxX X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... venue, New Delhi, with effect from 01 st April 2010. 2. Attention of the trade is also invited to this office Trade Notice No.03/2009 (C.EX) dated 10.9.2009 intimating the roll out of Automation of Central Excise and Service Tax (ACES) in Hyderabad - IV Commissionerate and the brief procedure for Registration. 3. Director General (Systems), Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has prepared comprehensive instructions outlining the procedure for electronic payment of taxes under ACES and electronic filing of excise/Service Tax returns. The same is reproduced below for the convenience of the trade. The said instructions outline the registration process for new assessees, existing assessees, non-assessees and for Large Taxpayers Unit assessees, steps for preparing and filing of return, using of XML Schema for filing dealers' return, procedure for obtaining acknowledgement of E-filed return, procedure for E-payment, etc. The trade are hereby requested to note and follow the instructions. Procedure for Electronic filing of Central Excise and Service Tax returns and Electronic Payment of Taxes In continuation of its efforts ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he Department 2. Save Time 3. Reduce Paper Work 4. Online Registration and Amendment of Registration Details 5. Electronic filing of all documents such as applications for registration, returns [On-line and off-line downloadable versions of ER 1,2,3,4,5,6, Dealer Return, and ST3], claims, permissions and intimations; provisional assessment request, export-related documents, refund request 6. System-generated E-Acknowledgement 7. Online tracking of the status of selected documents 8. Online view facility to see selected documents 9. Internal messaging system on business-related matters IV. Registration Process: To transact business on ACES a user has to first register himself/herself with ACES through a process called 'Registration with ACES'. This registration is not a statutory registration as envisaged in Acts/Rules governing Central Excise and Service Tax but helps the application in recognizing the bonafide users. Described below are steps for taking registration by a new assessee, existing assessee, non-assessee and a Large Tax Pa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... 11. The registration number will be same as the current 15- digit format with minor change such as For-PAN based Assessees 1-10 digits - PAN of the Assessee 11-12 digits-EM (Excise Manufacturer), ED (Excise Dealer), SD (Service Tax) 13-15-Systems generated alphanumeric serial number For non-PAN based assessees 1-4 digits TEMP 5-10 Systems generated alpha numeric number 11-12 EM (Excise Manufacturer) or ED (Excise Dealer), SD (Service Tax) 13-15-Systems generated alphanumeric serial number (b) Existing Assessee 1. The existing assessees will not have to take fresh registrations. They will have to only register with the ACES application. This can be done in the following manner : ACES application will automatically send mails to the e-mail IDs of the assessee, as available in the existing registration data base, indicating a TPIN number, and password. The mail will contain a hyperlink to the website. Assessee clicks on the hyperlink and is taken to ACES application Assessee sub ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ated officer of the Commissionerate, on behalf of the non-assessee. (d) Large Tax Payer Unit (LTU) Assessee/CIient 1. The consent form will have to be submitted manually by the New LTU assessees to the jurisdictional LTU office which will be processed off line 2. The approved consent form will be uploaded by the competent officer of the Group LTU (GLTU) into ACES 3. Any new unit of an existing LTU, which applies for registration with ACES will be automatically attached with the L TU Commissionerate based upon PAN details in the registration form 4. As soon as the new or existing unit is attached with the L TU Commissionerate, a suitable intimation will be automatically sent by the ACES to the existing jurisdictional Commissionerate and the pending items of work will be transferred to the LTU Commissionerate 5. For existing L TU assessees, the process of registration is same as explained in Sub Para (b) above. IMPORTANT: i. The user ID once selected will be permanent and cannot be changed. However, it is desirable to frequently change passwords ii. The Us ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... the return. Instructions for using the offline utilities are given in detail in the Help section, under 'Download' link and assessees are advised to follow them. (vii) Returns uploaded through this procedure are validated by the ACES before acceptance into the system which may take up to one business day. Assessee can track the status of the return by selecting the appropriate option in the RET sub menu. The status will appear as uploaded meaning under process by ACES, Filed meaning successfully accepted by the system or Rejected meaning the ACES has rejected the return due to validation error. The rejected returns can be resubmitted after corrections. (viii) Once the Central Excise returns are filed online in ACES or uploaded to the system using the off-line utility, the same can not be modified or cancelled by the assessee. The Service Tax returns, however, can be modified once as per rules up to 90 days from the date of filing the initial return. (ix) Self-assessed CE returns, after scrutiny by the competent officer, may result into modification. Both the 'Original' and the 'Reviewed' return can be viewed by ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... essees are required to write to the department authorizing one of the CFCs, from the approved list, to work in ACES on their behalf. They have to furnish the name and other details of the CFCs, including the registration No issued by the ICAI/ICWAI etc. At any given time, one assessee can authorize one CFC, while one CFC can provide services to more than one assessee throughout India. In case the assessee wants to withdraw the authorization, it can do so by intimating the department. However, an assessee will be held liable for all actions of omission or commission of the CFC, during the period they are authorized by him/her to work in ACES. (d). Validation of the entries made while filling return At the time of making entry in the electronic format of the relevant return, the software does some preliminary validation for ensuring correctness of data, either concurrently or at the time of saving / submitting the return. This validation process is automated. The user is prompted by the application software to correct the particulars entered wherever required. In respect of certain entries, although the application alerts the assessee about any entry fou ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... owledges it by displaying an Acknowledgement message. A unique document reference number is generated which consist of 15-digit registration number of the assessee, name of the return filed, the period for which return is filed etc. This is also automatically communicated to the email id of the assessee by the application. In the case of an uploaded Central Excise return, using offline utility, similar acknowledgement is generated and sent after the acceptance of the return by the system as a valid return i.e. when the status changes to 'FILED'. (f). Class of Assessees for whom e-filing of returns and e-payment is mandatory with effect from 1 st April, 2010: 1. In terms of Notification No 04/2010-CentraI Excise (N.T.) dated the 19th February, 2010, an assessee, who has paid total duty of rupees ten lakh or more including the amount of duty paid by utilization of CENVAT credit in the preceding financial year, is required to file the monthly or quarterly return, as the case may be, electronically, under sub-rule (1) of Rule 12 of the Central Excise Rules, 2002 and deposit the duty electronically through internet banking under sub-rule (1) of Rul ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... l.com/EST/) or they can directly visit the EASIEST portal. 3. Procedure for e-Payment: i. To pay Excise Duty and Service Tax online, the assessee has to enter the 15 digit Assessee Code allotted by the department under erstwhile SACER/SAPS or the current application ACES. ii. There will be an online check on the validity of the Assessee Code entered. iii. If the Assessee code is valid, then corresponding assessee details like name, address, Commissionerate Code etc. as present in the Assessee Code Master will be displayed. iv. Based on the Assessee Code, the duty / tax i.e. Central Excise duty or Service Tax to be paid will be automatically selected. v. The assessee is required to select the type of duty / tax to be paid by clicking on Select Accounting Codes for Excise or Select Accounting Codes for Service Tax, depending on the type of duty / tax to be paid. vi. At a time the assessee can select up to six Accounting Codes. vii. The assessee should also select the bank through which payment is to be made. viii. On submission of data entered, a confirmation sc ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ttributed to the department's IT infrastructure such as problems in accessing CBEC's ACES application due to server, network or application being down, proportionate time will be deducted from the date of uploading of successfully 'filed' returns to ascertain the actual date and time of filing of the return. Since the department maintains logs of such technical failures, in case of any dispute, the decision of the department will be final. VI. Digital Signatures The ACES application is designed to accept digitally signed documents. However, in the beginning this functionality is not going to be activated. Pending its activation the electronic returns will be filed into ACES without digital signatures. Hence, wherever the returns are submitted through ACES there will not be any requirement to submit signed hard copy separately. VII. System Requirements for ACES To use ACES following systems requirements are recommended: Processor: Intel Pentium Ill and higher RAM: 256 MB and higher HDD: 80 GB and more Web Browser: IE 6.0 and above, Netscape 6.2 and a ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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