In what could be a
good news for lakhs of taxpayers, the Income Tax Department will now process and send refunds in a short
time of 7-10 days as its latest technology upgrade of electronic and
Aadhaar-based ITR verification has begun on a successful note.
The
department’s latest initiative to verify an Income Tax Return (ITR) by Aadhaar
or other bank database has received positive response from ITR filers because
of which the taxman, for Assessment Year 2015-16, was able to process and send
refunds to bank accounts of eligible taxpayers in less than 15 days time.
CLICK HERE TO CHECK YOUR INCOME TAX REFUND STATUS FOR ASSESSMENT YEAR 2015-16
“The days are gone when getting an I-T refund used to
take months or in some cases even a few years. The new electronic verification
e-filing system has proved to be very customer-friendly and as a token of
thanks to the taxpayers, the department is working to ensure their refunds are
sent in a week’s time or a maximum of ten days.
“This is
surely the way forward in the administration of tax affairs in the country,” a
top officer of the department involved in these operations said.
According to latest statistics, the department received
2.06 crore returns on its e-filing portal as on September 7, 2015 (last date
for ITR filing), which is an increase of 26.12 per cent over the last year when
1.63 crore returns were filed online.
The department’s Central Processing Centre (CPC) as on
September 7 processed 45.18 lakh returns and issued refunds to 22.14 lakh tax
payers relating to assessment year 2015-16, it added.
During this period, the department electronically
verified over 32.95 lakh e-returns.
The data added that peak filing rate touched 3,475
returns per minute this time as compared to 2,901 returns per minute last year.
As per some testimonials received by the department from
taxpayers, also accessed by PTI, many have reported that they received their
refunds in only 11 or 13 days time from the day of filing their ITR.
