E-filing of I-T returns for INDIAN government Income TAX Department: It’s so simple!

You have just three more days to file your income-tax returns. If you want to do it without much bother, you should consider e-filing. It's simple if you take care of a few things.
You need to go to the website incometaxindiae-filing.gov.in and download the relevant returns form (ITR 1 to 7) based on your sources of income. For instance, if your only sources of income are salary/pension, interest income and income/loss from one house property, then you can use ITR 1. The website explains who should use which.
Select the Excel version of the form. Very importantly, enable Macros in the form. People often fail to do that because the 'Enable Macros' messaging is not very clear on the website/form. A help file that gets downloaded with the Excel form explains how to enable Macros. If Macros are not enabled, many of the required fields in the form do not perform their required functions.
Read the other instructions on the website and fill up all the mandatory fields in all the forms. Particularly ensure that you have written your PAN number correctly. Pressing the `Calculate Tax' button on the form tells you how much tax you need to pay or how much you need to be refunded (you don't need to know anything about tax rates).

If you have taxes to pay, then these can be paid online through the incometaxindia.gov.in website. Once that's done, details of the counterfoil of the tax paid challan must be entered in the Excel form that you downloaded.

Pressing the `Validate' button on top of each form tells you whether you have filled up the forms correctly. Once validated, press the `Generate XML' button on the top right of the form, and an XML version of the form gets created on your PC.

Now go once again to the e-filing website, and choose the assessment year for which you are filing (it will be AY 11-12, if you are filing for financial year 2010-11). You will be asked to register yourself, which again is a simple process. Once registered, use your login and password to login again, you will be asked to upload the XML file. The moment you upload and send it, you will have access to an ITR-V form, which is the acknowledgement form. You need to take a print out of this on a laser printer (so that the barcode on it is printed properly), you need to sign it and then send it to the Centralized Processing Center (address provided on website) by ordinary post within 120 days.

"e-filing is one of the best things to have happened," says Sunil Birla, partner in chartered accountancy firm BDO India. "You can do everything from home. No running around to income tax offices. It's possible to complete the entire process in 10-12 minutes. In our firm, what took 15 people to do now takes just 3 people."
If you file online, tax refunds will also happen much faster (within three months) than if you file paper returns. But for refunds, ensure that you fill up your address, email id and bank account details accurately. As per data provided by the Centralized Processing Center that is managed jointly by the I-T department and Infosys Technologies, more than 4.28 lakh refunds for assessment years 2009-10 and 2010-11 have not happened because of wrong address or bank account details.

Know more about your PAN(Permanent Account number) number Structure

The Permanent Account Number under new series is based on following constant permanent parameters of a taxpayer and uses Phonetic Soundex code algorithm to ensure uniqueness :-

 i. Full name of the taxpayer;

 ii. Date of birth / Date of Incorporation;

 iii. Status;

 iv. Gender in case of individuals; and

 v. Father’s name in case of individuals (including in the cases of married ladies)

 These five fields are called core fields, without which PAN can not be allotted

The fourth character of the PAN must be one of the following, depending on the type of assesse:
C — Company
P — Person
H — HUF(Hindu Undivided Family)
F — Firm
A — Association of Persons (AOP)
T — AOP (Trust)
B — Body of Individuals (BOI)
L — Local Authority
J — Artificial Juridical Person
G — Govt
The fifth character of the PAN is the first character (a) of the surname / last name of the person. In the case of Personal Pan card, where the fourth character is “P” or (b) of the name of the Entity/ Trust/ Society/ Organisation in the case of Company/ HUF/ Firm/ AOP/ BOI/ Local Authority/ Artificial Jurdical Person/ Govt, where the fourth character is “C”,”H”,”F”,”A”,”T”,”B”,”L”,”J”,”G”

The phonetic PAN (PPAN) is a new concept which helps prevent allotment of more than one PAN to assessees with same / similar names. AIS works out the PPAN based on some important key fields of an assessee using an internal algorithm. At the time of PAN allotment, the PPAN of the assessee is compared with the PPANs of all the assessees to whom PAN has been allotted all over the nation. If a matching PPAN is detected, a warning is given to the user and a duplicate PPAN report is generated. In such cases, a new PAN can only be allotted if the Assessing Officer chooses to override the duplicate PPAN detection.

A unique PAN can be allotted under this system to 17 crore taxpayers under each alphabet under each status (i.e. individual, HUF, Firm, Company, Trusts, Body of Individuals, Association of Persons etc.)

Objectives sought : PAN was introduced keeping in view the following objectives :-

i.  to facilitate linking of various documents and information, including payment of taxes, assessment, tax demand, arrears etc. relating to an assessee.
ii.  to facilitate easy retrieval of information.
iii.  to facilitate matching of information relating to investment, raising of loans and other business activities of taxpayers collected through various sources, both internal as well as external, for widening of tax base and detecting and combating tax evasion through non-intrusive means.

If you want to know the PAN card just click here and fill this form and get your PAN card info . If you want to know about TAN then click here
 PAN can be verified online by filling out the core details mentioned in the PAN Card like NAME,DOB,FATHER’s name click here

IF you have applied for PAN/TAN then you know your status at TAX INFORMATION NETWORK site or at UTI site