Last date for payment of GST, filing of return for July 2017 extended by 5 days to August 25

The last date for payment of Goods and Services Tax and filing of return for July 2017 extended by 5 days on Saturday. Now, the last date for filing GST returns, tax payment will be August 25.

Earlier, the last date for filing return was August 20.

The GST website faced technical glitch as the deadline for filing returns neared on Saturday.

GSTN Chairman Navin Kumar said the site since has been restored and tax filing restarted. “There was a minor glitch because of the overload, which has been set right,” he added.

Earlier, the cut-off for filing maiden GST returns for July was scheduled to end tomorrow, which explained the heavy traffic at ‘www.gst.gov.in’.

But the portal suffered technical glitches as it was unable to take the load.

In a statement, the finance ministry said: “The GST Implementation Committee, consisting of state and central government officers, has taken a decision to extend the last date for payment of GST for July 2017 to August 25, 2017.”

It said certain flood-hit states as well as Jammu and Kashmir had sought an extension.

For taxpayers who have to claim credit for past taxes paid by filing form TRANS 1, the last date for returns will be August 28.

“In order not to face any last moment technological difficulty in submission of returns, all taxpayers are requested to kindly file their return well before 25^th / 28^th of August 2017 and not wait for the last date,” the ministry said.

Since today morning, traders across the country faced difficulties in filing returns and uploading GSTR 3B on the GST Network portal—the company mandated to build the IT backbone for the new indirect tax regime.

GST Network took to twitter, saying, “The GST portal is experiencing some issues. Kindly try after some time.”

The filing of maiden GST returns for July commenced on August 5.

As the problem surfaced, the website of ‘gst.gov.in’ ran a scroll: “We are experiencing slowness and are working to improve the response. Please bear with us.”

Under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime, which was implemented from July 1, businesses are expected to file monthly tax returns.

While 72 lakh assessees of the old indirect tax regime have migrated to the GST Network portal, nearly 50 lakh have completed the migration process.

With PTI inputs