The government has notified certain procedural changes in the GST rules, including those related to threshold, for filing annual returns for the 2021-22 fiscal, a move that will help ease the compliance burden on small players.

The changes were vetted by the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council at its meeting last week.

With the amendments notified by the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC), businesses have also been allowed to make tax payments on the GSTN portal by using IMPS and UPI payment modes.

Businesses with an aggregate annual turnover of up to Rs 2 crore in the fiscal ended March 31, 2022, are exempt from filing annual returns for 2021-22, as per the amended rules.

KPMG in India Partner (Indirect Tax) Abhishek Jain said these changes will help the small players in undertaking compliances and will lighten the burden for taxpayers with less than Rs 2 crore turnover to the extent of filing annual returns under GST.

AMRG & Associates Senior Partner Rajat Mohan said other important changes include an extension of time-limit specified under Section 73 (determination of tax) under the GST Act for issuance of an order for FY 2017-18 to September 30, 2023.

However, no extensions have been provided for any other financial year.

"About the delayed filing of refund applications during the COVID period (March 1, 2020, to February 28, 2022), a suitable extension has been granted that will enable numerous exporters to encash the refunds stuck in litigation," Mohan said.

Jain said that considering the COVID scenario of the last two years for India, the government has extended the limitation period under GST for issuance of notice to taxpayers who have not paid/ short paid the tax due. Similarly, relaxation in limitation is granted for filing refunds.

"While the government intends to curb revenue leakage, this change keeps the businesses exposed to departmental audits and assessments for some additional time. This being said, this change also ensures that genuine taxpayers are not denied their refund claims," Jain added.

According to Mohan, the manner of calculation of interest on delayed payment of tax has been notified and that would help taxpayers in making precise calculations of the tax dues.

As per the amended rules, every invoice issued by an MSME supplier will have a standard declaration printed on the invoice regarding the non-applicability of e-invoice.

Also, the cash ledger balance can be transferred from one GST registered entity to another under the same PAN.

The changes were approved by the GST Council, comprising finance ministers of the Centre and state, at its June 28-29 meeting.