Exclusive | E-commerce companies, MSMEs seek easier norms in new invoice management system
As the government gears up to implement the newly launched invoice management system to plug in tax leakages and ensure smooth goods and services tax (GST) compliance, the industry has flagged some serious concerns to the government seeking a middle path. Players from the e-commerce industry, MSMEs, and industry chambers have approached the government to ease norms, and sources say that the government, including the Finance Ministry and the GST authorities, especially the IT-backbone GSTN, are in discussions to iron out the same.
According to the industry, the new invoice management system would increase the overall cost of compliance for small sellers. The industry claims that the sellers will need qualified resources and a dedicated IT setup to be able to ensure new compliance.
“Specifically, e-commerce has high transaction volumes and the present structure of IMS requires transaction-level action on all vendor invoices and transaction review of customer actions, both of which are dynamic statements and need to be refreshed multiple times during the month,” say the representations.
According to the government, to enable taxpayers to efficiently address invoice corrections/amendments with their suppliers through the portal, a new communication process is being brought to the portal which will facilitate taxpayers in matching their records/invoices vis-à-vis issued by their suppliers for availing the correct Input Tax Credit (ITC). GSTN has developed a new functionality called Invoice Management System (IMS) which will allow the recipient taxpayers to either accept or reject an invoice or to keep it pending in the system, which can be availed later.
