Filing of form 15CA and 15CB – Some practical issues

 Form 15CA and 15CB 

Normally, when any money is to be remitted outside India, the bankers often ask for the copies of form 15CA and 15CB which need to be filed electronically. It means that firstly the assessee need to upload form 15CA and 15CB electronically which requires e- verification through EVC mode and later copy of same need to be submitted to the banker for further processing of remittance outside India.

Form 15CA and 15CB need to be filed even if all the taxes are already paid in India. Therefore, one cannot take a plea that since all the taxes are already paid, so what is the need for electronically uploading form 15CA and 15CB.

For instance, often when an NRI disposed of his property in India, He need to compute capital gain tax liability, sometimes there is no capital gain tax but refund in the case of the assessee. However, while making remittance of sale proceeds, He needs to submit copy of form 15CA and 15CB.

Another issue which normally arises in cases where remittances are to be made to NRIs is that NRIs do not have Indian mobile number but an international mobile numbers. Now, at the time of e-verification, OTPs are send to the mobile numbers linked to the Aadhar as well to the mobile numbers which are linked to the registered bank account. In both the cases, it is compulsory to have an Indian mobile number. However, NRIs normally have an international mobile numbers. In such a situation, NRIs may opt for following procedures:

a)      They may verify the forms electronically by using digital signature or through Aadhar OTP

b)      Second option is to verify the form 15CA and 15CB filed electronically, by using the net banking facilities of specified banks in India.

c)      If aforesaid options do not work, another option is to call the grievance cell of the Income Tax Department or file your grievance online asking them to give permission for sending OTP to some international mobile number or some other alternate Indian mobile number.

Further, with the introduction of new Income tax department portal, the assesse’s have faced some problems since there were lot of technical glitches in the portal and accordingly, CBDT has come out with a circular that form 15CA and 15CB can be filed on a manual manner with the AD banker instead of filing the forms electronically and once the portal starts functioning in a proper manner, such forms which have filed earlier filed manually may be filed electronically.

Accordingly, the CBDT has recently issued another circular prescribing the procedure to be followed by all those assessee who have manually filed form 15CA and 15CB to now file such form electronically.

It may further be noted that non filing of form 15CA and 15CB is a serious noncompliance which may lead to a penalty of approx. Rs 1 lac therefore, every assessee should comply with the uploading of form 15CA and 15CB electronically at the time of remittance of money outside India or at the time of transfer of money from NRO to NRE account.