Note on Archival of GST Returns data

by Mr. R. SRIVATSAN, IRS, NACIN, Chennai

The provision of Section 39 (11) of the CGST Act, 2017 is implemented w.e.f 01-10-2023 vide Notification No. 28/2023 – Central Tax dated 31st July, 2023.

The above change provides that the taxpayers shall not be allowed file their GST returns after the expiry of a period of three years from the due date of furnishing the said return.

Further, as per GST portal data policy data for view of taxpayer to be retained for seven years only.

Therefore, the same data policy is being implemented on the GST portal.

Thus, return data will not be available to view beyond 7 years for taxpayers.

The effect of this implementation is that on 01st August 2024 return filed for July 2017 has been archived and on 01st September 2024, data for August 2017 has been archived.

Further, this data archival is going to be a monthly activity hence on 01st October, 2024 data of September 2017 shall be taken down from the GST portal and so on so forth.

Hence, the GSTN has advised that taxpayers may download their relevant data from the GST portal for any future reference, if required.

Well……

As per GST portal data policy, data for view by the taxpayer is to be retained for 7 years only.

Therefore, return data will not be available to view beyond 7 years on GST portal.