Salaried taxpayers will now get SMS alerts from the Income Tax Department on the amount deducted at source by their employers.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes on Monday launched the service alert for 2.5 crore salaried employees in a bid to cut down TDS mismatches. It also plans a slew of other measures for taxpayers including faster refunds and more tax return preparers.

“This information is important for small taxpayers as they don’t have the capacity to pay taxes twice or to litigate,”said Finance Minister Arun Jaitley after inaugurating the service, adding that better facilities and services to the taxpayers are the central to direct tax reforms.

The CBDT contends that of the 12.5 lakh TDS mismatches it finds annually, 78 per cent or 9.73 lakh belong to that of salaried employees. “Often deductors don’t upload a statement of the TDS, which leads to the mismatch,” said Rani Singh Nair, Chairperson, CBDT.

She further said the service alert will gradually be given every month so that taxpayers know their TDS on a real time basis. It will also be extended to another 4.4 crore non-salaried taxpayers The CBDT is also fast tracking income tax refunds in cases where there are mismatches of up to ₹1 lakh and demands of up to ₹5,000.To improve its taxpayer services, which also boosts compliance, the department plans to set up 65 more Aaykar Seva Kendras and install automatic cheque deposit machines.The CBDT also announced that it is working on a taxpayer friendly website and an app that will help in tax computations. It also plans to conduct an opinion survey to get feedback from assesees on areas of improvement.

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