Form 26AS to include foreign remittance

The income tax department notified a host of new tax-related information to be included in Form 26AS.

The following eight new inclusions will be incorporated in the annual information statement, more commonly known as Form 26AS:

Introduction of these new inclusions are in line with the finance minister’s announcement in Budget 2020 for a more comprehensive Form 26AS. This move is aimed at increasing the scope of the annual information statement that will ease income tax return (ITR) filing for taxpayers and also help plug tax leaks.

“This new reporting in Form 26AS will help both taxpayers as well as tax authorities in assessing a taxpayer’s profile and bring better flow of information between taxpayer and the tax authorities,” said Shailesh Kumar, Partner, Nangia & Co LLP.

Form 26AS of a taxpayer includes information on tax deducted at source (TDS) on her incomes, advance tax, if any, paid by her, tax refund received in a financial year, high-value transactions, among other things.

It comes handy at the time of filing ITR as one can import the details in it to auto-populate the ITR form. Form 26AS can be viewed and downloaded on either the TRACES website or through net banking facility of banks.

“With all the information available at one place, it will assist tax authorities during e-assessment and also limit interaction with taxpayers as the authorities will be able to compare information available in Form 26AS vis-a-vis information reported by a taxpayer in his ITR,” said Kumar.