CBEC initiates process of migration of existing central excise & service tax assesses to GST

With a goal to meet the government's aim of meeting April 1 deadline for implementing GST across India, the CBEC has initiated the process of migration of its existing central excise and service tax assesses to the new tax regime with effect from Monday.

"As part of its efforts to ensure implementation of GST by April 1, 2017, Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has taken steps to ensure that its existing taxpayers are migrated to GST in a simple, user-friendly and smooth manner," Press Information Bureau of India (PIB) said in a press release quoting Ministry of Finance, as stating on Monday. 

Once the existing registered taxpayers (both central excise as well as service tax) login to CBEC’s web portal www.aces.gov.in, a facility will be given in a secure manner to access the provisional login ID and password given by Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN), cited the official statement of Ministry of Finance. 

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Both houses of Indian parliament Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha had approved the GST Bill  in 2016. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) is aimed at subsuming all taxes such as VAT, excise, etc,. under one unified tax.

The Ministry of Finance further said that if tax assesses have already initiated the process of migration to GST as a VAT assesses under State Commercial Tax department, no further action is necessary. 

PAN is mandatory for migration to GST. Hence, if the existing central excise and service tax Registration Code does not have PAN, then PAN has to be obtained from Income Tax Department and the registration details have to be updated in the ACES Portal, it further added. 

In order to assist existing central excise and service tax assesses with their queries, CBEC has made available 24x7 Helpdesk toll-free number- 1800-1200-232 and an e-mail id -cbecmitra.helpdesk@icegate.gov.in.  

Moreover, CBEC has requested  existing central excise and service tax assesses to migrate to GST as early as possible by January 31 this year.

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