E-Commerce & Writing Industry: Your Guide To GST Law 2017

While GST is the latest talk of the town, its roll out has been marked for July 1^st, 2017. With this unique roll out, which implies one country, one tax rule, has the agreement and acceptance of each state confirming the Goods and Services Tax regime.

With a mutual agreement by all and with everyone’s consent, 1^st July has been confirmed as the onset of the new GST Law 2017. Last month, the GST Council categorized 1200 products under the tax brackets of 5, 12, 18 and 28%, and things are now finalized.

But, is the marketplace and writing industry ready for the GST implementation? How will they pay their taxes?

Here’s an effort to answer all the queries that have been surrounding all the relatables of the marketplace and writing industry:

Q1. What is the minimum annual revenue for registering under GST?

A1. For registering under GST, Rs 20 lakh is the onset annual revenue, beyond which businesses or the service providers will require to be registered under GST. Also, please note, for all the businesses operating in North Eastern states, for them the limit is Rs 10 lakh.

Q2. Should you register under GST? I operate a small-scale business…

A2. Under Section 19 r/w Schedule-III of the Model GST Laws, every form of online business needs to be registered under GST, irrespective of the income generated.

Q3. What Exactly Is A Marketplace business, as per GST?

A3. Section 43B(d) of the MGL (Model GST Law) describes e-commerce business as “Electronic Commerce to mean the supply or receipt of goods and/ or services, or transmitting of funds or data, over an electronic network, primarily the internet, by using any of the applications that rely on the internet, like but not limited to e-mail, instant messaging, shopping carts, web services, Universal Description Discovery and Integration (UDDI), File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) whether or not the payment is conducted online and whether or not the ultimate delivery of the goods and/or services is done by the operator.”

Q4. How about GST Registration for Bloggers?

A4. The new GST law is very clear about who all are required to be registered in India. As per section 24 of the Central GST Act, every person who is earning any income from outside the state or outside the country is required to get GST registration and the exemption limit shall not apply.

If you are a service provider, i.e. blogger, and generating income from outside India (export of services), then GST registration is mandatory and exemption limit shall not apply. Further, under GST, the blogging services are covered under online information and database access or retrieval services.

Q5. How blogging will be taxed under GST?

A5. No threshold limit of Rs.20 Lakh for Bloggers. The GST tax rate for bloggers is 18%. For more details about GST for blogging or bloggers, visit here.

Q6. What if you do not register under GST?

A6. The only consequence to this is, your business will suffer. The current tax law only implies a fine to be paid for the non-registration. But, with GST coming into act, the government will imply a rating to your business that will be open to the eye of buyers and sellers connected to your business. But, under Compliance Rating Score (CRS) under GST, Govt. will rate your business as per your GST tax paying habits, and accordingly, your business might suffer. Hence, no GST means, no business for you.

Q7. How can I register as a business with GST?

A7. Just visit gst.gov.in, and get started. Also, there are several firms which provide professional services for registering your business with GST and subsequently file the returns as well. You can do this by just a simple Google search.

Q8. How many returns will be required to file under GST?

A8. For any business, there will be a total of 37 returns to be filed every year, which is 3 per month and one annual return. Note here, that this covers only one state. Hence, if your business is operating in three states, then the total number of returns filed shall be 111, and so on. And, everything has to be online, and digital. No paper ledger books and account books.

Though GST Law 2017 is coming up with surprises for all, some good and some bad, but a unified taxing system will surely be a breather in the long run.

So, get prepared for your GST process and make the most of it for your business’s success.

Do share your feedback or anything that you will like to add in the above information.

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