[sairamboko]

Originally Posted by Rodie09

Hello Sairamboko,

I am assuming this is your first property. Rules for second house are totally different.

1. Usually, you cannot claim any benefits of home loan until the construction is complete. So for apartments, its only possible after possession. I'd assume similar rule will apply in your case too. If the construction is complete before March 2018, with full loan disbursed, then yes, you can claim all tax benefits while filing returns for FY2017-18.

2. If I remember correctly, you can also claim entire amount of stamp duty as well under Sec 80C but only if stamp duty was paid in the same financial year and again, the construction has to be complete.

3. As for the interest part on the home loan, even if the construction does not get over this FY, you should be able to claim the benefit of all pre EMI interest and regular interest divided equally over next 5 years. Of course, the interest benefit cap for each year still applies.

4. Don't think there are any other benefits you can claim out of home loan. Also, be mindful that once you are claiming a home loan benefit, you should have good reasons to justify any HRA claims - so the HRA benefit will go away if you are living in your own house and availing home loan tax benefits. There are some exceptions to it - you can easily find the info on internet.

Hope above was helpful.

Thanks a lot Roadie!! This is very helpful. yes, its my first property. I will take help of a CA while filing my IT returns and yes, I will lose HRA once i occupy my property. Thanks again for your information!!

[Thad E Ginathom]

Senior citizen: Advance Tax?

Hello gentlemen (and ladies?) of the profession. I reached the age of 65 on July 4th 2017, so I am very much a senior citizen. My understanding is that, of past year (or two?), senior citizens have not had to pay advance tax on income. Today I received this letter:

What to do? Advice please.

[Bomi]

Section 207 has conditions like person not having any business income, being a resident in India during the financial year in question, to avail the exemption from advance tax payment. Do you fulfill those? If yes, reply to the notice stating your position, with reference to these conditions.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Bomi

Section 207 has conditions like person not having any business income, being a resident in India during the financial year in question, to avail the exemption from advance tax payment. Do you fulfill those? If yes, reply to the notice stating your position, with reference to these conditions.

Thank you very much. We have no business and I am resident. Incomes comes only from bank interest and pension

[Ponmayilal]

Originally Posted by arindambasu13

My refund took almost three and a half months to disburse from the IT department and finally reach me. It was not a direct credit to my account, but was rather a check sent by speed post which I received yesterday. Though it took some time in coming, its indeed a nice feeling to get back part of the your hard earned money that you thought was no more yours

In my case it took 4months plus to get the refund.
02 Jul 2017: Returns filed
02 Nov 2017: Intimation under section 143(1) dated 26 Oct 2017 admitting the refund received by email
11 Nov 2017: Cheque dated 08 Nov 2017 from refund Banker, SBI, Hyderabad received by Speed Post.

All is well that ends well.

[sindabad.sailor]

I was on assignment abroad whereby I missed filing returns.

On returning this year, I found a notice from IT asking reasons for not filing returns. I replied to it on Compliance section of website mentioning that I was away and would do so soon.

Now I am unable to file the returns for AY 2015-16 and apparently the last date has been missed. I managed to submit same for the last 2 years and same got processed within 2 days.

Consultant advised that since I was Non Resident in 2015-16, with No Indian income, I actually do not need to file. However I can't even make additional comments on compliance website anymore.

Just wondering what should I do hereon. If possible, I would prefer having nil tax due return filed, immaterial of whether I need to do it or not.

Rgds.

[clevermax]

I am trying to do a rectification in the TDS (other than salary) section for my father. I wanted to correct the TAN of one of the bank accounts. In the rectification workflow, I selected the option

"Tax payer is correcting data for Tax Credit Mistmatch only"

Then the following screen appears, which asks for TDS certificate number:



Should I goto the respective bank and ask for a TDS certificate to get the TDS certificate number? Or is there an online way of getting it? Please note that TDS certificate number itself is required; not the TDS certificate, which can be obtained online by giving the TDS certificate number.

If we directly goto the income tax office, can this be settled without having to go around various banks to get the TDS certificate numbers?

[bluevolt]

Guys, I filed my returns on 9th July and the status is still 'Successfully e-Verified'. I haven't got my refund yet.

Last year, I got my refund within two months of filing returns.

Why the process has been delayed by this much time? Anyone facing same scenario?

[Nonstop-driver]

Originally Posted by bluevolt

Guys, I filed my returns on 9th July and the status is still 'Successfully e-Verified'. I haven't got my refund yet.

Last year, I got my refund within two months of filing returns.

Why the process has been delayed by this much time? Anyone facing same scenario?

Login to your income tax account. There you can check status of your refund and also remind the AO to process it. I tried it for my friend, got the refund in 2 days.

[Ithaca]

I am attaching two pic below.
This was forwarded to me by my friend.
This is regarding NRI with PPF accounts with SBI Bank.
My friend converted his savings account with SBI to NRO and has decided to stop his PPF.
He is looking at a loss of about 50% of his PPF contribution due to change of rules regarding PPF and NRIs.

The attached pics imply that once an account holder has changed his status from Resident Indian to NRI, the interest will be computed as Simple Savings Interest from the date the individual becomes an NRI.

I request learned members with knowledge about Income Tax to shed some light on this development for the benefit of Tax illiterate members like me.

[binand]

Originally Posted by Ithaca

He is looking at a loss of about 50% of his PPF contribution due to change of rules regarding PPF and NRIs.

You really scared me there. There is no 50% loss of contribution; the loss is in the interest earned.

One thing I don't understand is that ROR/RNR/NRI etc. status is applicable for the entire financial year; so a person cannot be resident till 31/12/2014 and be NRI from 1/1/2015. It seems to me SBI's illustration could do with some improvements.

But leaving that aside, what this essentially means is that you get the tax-free 7.6% interest as long as you are not an NRI; and starting the FY you become an NRI you only get the savings bank interest rate (PO rate is 4%).

The thing is, if you are an NRI only your income in India is taxed; so there is a tax liability on this 4% only if your PPF balance exceeds 62.5L (assuming you have no other income in India). So if you have 1 Crore in your PPF account, then the interest = 4L, tax on this interest = (4L - 2.5L) x 10% = 15K. If you can use your section 80C to the fullest even that 15K liability vanishes.

Disclaimer: I am not a tax practitioner. :-)

[Ithaca]

Originally Posted by binand

You really scared me there. There is no 50% loss of contribution; the loss is in the interest earned.

Disclaimer: I am not a tax practitioner. :-)

Thank you for your prompt reply and for putting across the interest earned figures. This makes it easier to compute and understand the liability my friend has. Will send him your reply so he can rest easy this weekend.

My friend was contributing the maximum allowable amount to his PPF. For the past few years, his interest earned on the investment made so far was Rs 1.5L approx and to this he was contributing the maximum allowed Rs 1.5L. He was afraid that the interest earned would be re-computed and he would lose a bunch of his money.

This issue affects most of my shippie friends who have PPF accounts, affects me too but my contributions have not been as heavy as my friends.

Thank you for taking the time to compose a reply to my query.

[mail4ajo]

Team, I am a NRI. I had capital gains to report last year. I invested the full amount of gains in notified Sec 54EC bonds.

How do I account for this on my return? Will I be liable to pay tax on this after 3 years upon maturity of the bond? I have no intention to build or buy home after 3 years.

[S_U_N]

I was on a short term assignment in Europe in Q4 of 2017.
I got some per diem allowance out of which some is still on my travel card (these are basically savings).

Now, what I have gathered is that all savings of per diem are taxable in the hands of the employee at normal tax rates.

The money is still on my travel card and I cannot as such use it until I travel again - may be in April 2018.
So question is when should I pay tax? Now? or in April 2018?

[binand]

Originally Posted by S_U_N

I was on a short term assignment in Europe in Q4 of 2017.
I got some per diem allowance [...]
So question is when should I pay tax? Now? or in April 2018?

Can't talk specifically of per-diem allowance, but the general rule is that tax is due when the taxable income accrues. In this case the income accrued in "Q4 of 2017" in your own words, so tax is due in FY 2017-18 itself.

Now, the next rule is that the department must get hold of the tax due from you (salaried person) in the following manner: 30% by Sep 15, 60% by Dec 15 and 100% by March 15 - or else they will charge interest and penalties. The safest strategy is to calculate the maximum tax due from you (your savings from the per diem allowance x your marginal tax rate) and pay it as advance tax before the next deadline (March 15).

Advance tax payment workflow starts from here:

https://onlineservices.tin.egov-nsdl.../tdsnontds.jsp

(Challan number is 280, and make sure you select assessment year as 2018-19).

You will get a BSR code and a couple of other numbers that you mention in your final IT return for AY 2018-19 (FY 2017-18) to get credit for this advance tax payment.