Annual Information System

The Income Tax department has a newly introduced Annual Information System (AIS) on the Income tax Portal which provides a comprehensive view of information to taxpayers. This new AIS includes some additional information relating to dividends, Securities or mutual funds transactions, Interest, foreign remittance information, property sale or purchase transaction, etc. The taxpayer should note that the Annual Information System (AIS) includes information that is available with the Income tax department and there may be other transactions that are not mentioned in the AIS. It’s each taxpayer’s responsibility to check all the information and report the accurate information while filing the Income tax return.

This Annual Information System (AIS) can be downloaded by clicking on the link “Annual Information Statement (AIS)” under the services tab. In case the taxpayer feels that the information or transaction mentioned in AIS is incorrect or doesn’t relate to him/her then an online feedback facility is also provided to them. The reported value and value after feedback will be shown separately in the AIS. Right now there is no limit on the number of times you can modify previously given feedback but we need to provide the correct reason and remarks as they may be taken up for review and approval after the modifications. For the ease of taxpayers filing the return, a simplified Taxpayer Information Summary (TIS) has also been generated for each taxpayer that shows the aggregated value for them. Once the taxpayer submitted feedback on AIS, the information in TIS will be automatically updated in real-time.

Difference between Form 26AS and AIS:

Form 26AS displays details of property purchases, High-value transactions, and TDS/TCS   transactions carried during the year. But AIS is the extension of Form 26AS which additionally includes saving interest, dividend, rent received, sale or purchase of securities/mutual funds/properties, etc. Also, AIS gives the option to submit feedback on the transactions reported.

Significance of Annual Information System AIS:

As all the information is available in one place now taxpayers will not face many challenges while collecting all the information regarding Income or taxation at the time of filing an Income Tax Return. Also, now most of the details can be captured by taxpayers, and chances of missing any income will be limited as all the income details are mentioned in AIS reports irrespective of whether or not the taxes are withheld. This will further reduce the chances of notices or inquiries from the department for errors.

It can be concluded that this is a great step to prevent and check tax evasion. In the future, we can expect many more such steps by the Income tax department to use artificial intelligence to detect tax evasion cases.

For more clarifications/information, please contact us at info@taxreturnwala.com