ExpertDabbler

Is it not kinda weird if I tell you that the name on your PAN card need not be the name as per the Income tax department’s database? Nevertheless it is a fact.

I decided to file my IT returns online this time. When I mean online, it is not as easy as booking a railway ticket. The whole process can be divided into six steps.

Step 1:
The first step is to get yourself registered with the Income-tax efiling website

The fields are : PAN number, DOB, First Name, Middle Name and Surname. The department properly butchered my name. At last I did some trial and error and managed to register in the site. There is a hack to confirm your PAN, and figure out how the department likes your name.

Step 2:
Keep a copy of your Form-16 handy. The next step is to download an excel sheet based on your income. It was ITR-2 for me. If you are filing based on your salary alone and Form-16 and not claiming any deduction on home loans, then a much simpler ITR-1 would suffice.

Filling in ITR-2 was bizzare to say the least. You do not have a clue as to which field is editable and which is not. And our IT department have been very liberal in sprinkling references to Schedules, IT Act section numbers etc. I had to take some help from my colleague Santhosh, a few calls to bangalore to my CA friend to sort out a few doubts. I thought things are simpler with ITR-1. In the end it was a great relief to fill in all the details.

Step 3:
Create an XML by clicking a ‘Create XML’ button in the excel sheet.

Step 4:
The XML had to be uploaded into the IT efiling website.

Step 5:
The site then converts the file into a PDF which we can download and print it out.

Step 6:
The printed out PDF has to be signed and taken to the nearest IT office within the next 15 days for an acknowledgement. I am assuming one does not have digital signature

My adventure was just half the fun. I volunteered to register for my friend with his PAN card. The Tax department database has conveniently left out the guy’s middle name

I tried ‘maane’ first, then ‘thaene’ first, then ‘maane thaene’ followed by ‘thaene maane’ etc etc. All the lessons learnt on permutations and combinations came in very handy. After an hour of hard work and with the help of the hack above, I managed to register for the guy.

The user experience of the whole process notwithstanding, I think doing this online filing still saves lot of time.

The departments can enlist the voluntary services of usability guys to make the whole process less intimidating.

PS:
I know the whole post is a bit too late as the deadline for filing IT returns ends on 31st July. But I still think it will be useful for lot of guys who search helplessly for information regarding e-filing of IT returns in the coming years.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 1st, 2008 at 8:17 am and is filed under Income tax, India News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.