GST officers to take steps to check export valuation, devise SOP for verification of risky taxpayers

GST officers will soon come out with measures to check valuation of exports and device a standard operating procedure (SOP) for physical spot verification of risky taxpayers, in order to plug loopholes and check evasion.

In the National GST Conference of Commissioners of State Tax and Zonal Chief Commissioners of Central Tax held last week, tax officials also decided to further examine steps that could be taken to stop new taxpayers from availing input tax credit (ITC).

It was also decided that GST officers would come out with SOPs for physical spot verification of risky taxpayers and for blocking and unblocking of ITC.

Measures to check export valuation, including capping of value for calculating export benefits and incentives, were also discussed and proposed for further examination, an official statement said.

During the meeting, states like Rajasthan, West Bengal, Odisha, Gujarat and Punjab made presentations on best practices followed by them in compliance management and revenue augmentation in their tax administration. The Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs' GST policy wing presented various measures in the pipeline for increased compliance management and revenue augmentation.

The focus of the GST officers has been to check evasion, and the investigation wing in commissionerates has in the recent past busted rackets of firms fraudulently claiming ITC.

During the April-January period of the current financial year, GST collection stood at Rs 10.19 lakh crore, down from Rs 11.7 lakh crore in the year-ago period.