NEW DELHI: The government is looking at linking the refund of goods and services tax (GST) to "risky and new" exporters with remittance of foreign exchange apart from accessing bank transaction details as part of an exercise to plug revenue leakage.

The issues were discussed at a meeting of top tax officers with revenue secretary AB Pandey on Tuesday, where it was decided to put in place a standard operating procedure (SOP) to fix fraudulent refund claims, including those related to sectors where the final product has higher GST than inputs and raw materials.

A committee of state and central officers has been tasked with finalising the SOP within a week so that it can be implemented by the end of the month.

To ensure better scrutiny of data, the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) will enter into an arrangement to share data with GST Network (GSTN) and Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) on a quarterly basis, instead of the current mechanism of an online exchange, an official release said.

This will help in profiling those indulging in frauds. Data analysis has already helped in detecting widespread GST evasion, especially fraudulent refunds by fly-bynight operators. The recent investigation of Integrated GST refunds to exporters has prompted GST officers to look at new ways to protect revenue. One of the suggestions is to mandate a single bank account for foreign remittance receipt and refund disbursement for better tracking, although businesses said that the move was intrusive and would burden the entire industry due to the fault of a few entities.

The officers also decided to explore access to banking transactions, including the bank account details by GST system, in consultation with RBI and NPCI. "It was also explored to make GST system aligned with Financial Intelligence Unit for the purpose of getting bank account details and transactions and also PAN-based banking transaction," the statement said.

Besides, all major cases of fake tax credit on inputs, export-import frauds and fraudulent refunds will also be probed by investigation wing of the income tax department.

Published On : 08-01-2020

Source : Times of India