How to File Form GSTR-9C on the GST Portal?

Taxpayers with an aggregate annual turnover exceeding Rs.5 crore in the previous financial year must file GSTR-9C via self-certification. Prior to the amendment, taxpayers with an aggregate annual turnover exceeding Rs.2 crore in the previous financial year were required to file GSTR-9C after getting their accounts audited and certified by a CA/CMA. 

Latest Updates

18th February 2023
49th GST Council meeting updates-
1. Council recommended the late fee rationalisation for delayed GSTR-9 filing from FY 2022-23 onwards as follows: 
   (a) Registered persons with Annual Aggregate Turnover (AATO) up to Rs.5 cr is reduced to Rs. 25 per day subject to a maximum of 0.02% of turnover.
   (b) Registered persons with AATO of more than Rs.5 cr to 20 cr is reduced to Rs 50 per day subject to a maximum of 0.02% of turnover.
2. The Council recommended an amnesty scheme for pending GSTR-9 returns. This scheme comes with a conditional waiver/ reduction of late fees.

5th July 2022 
The CBIC has exempted GST-registered taxpayers with annual aggregate turnover up to Rs.2 crore in FY 21-22 from filing Form GSTR-9. 

Pre-requisites to prepare and file GSTR-9C

To file the GSTR-9C form, there are a few pre-conditions that have to be fulfilled-

• The taxpayer must have a valid GSTIN and must be registered under GST.
• The login credentials of the taxpayer (Username and password) must be valid.
• The taxpayer should have filed Form GSTR-9 (Annual Return) for that financial year.
• The taxpayer’s business must have an aggregate turnover exceeding Rs.5 crore.

Steps to generate form GSTR-9C JSON file from the offline utility?

The taxpayer will have to perform steps both offline as well as on the GST portal-

Step 1: Log in to the GST portal and download the GSTR-9 form.

Step 2: Next, download the GSTR-9C tables derived from GSTR-9.

Step 3: The GSTR-9C Offline Tool must also be downloaded. This may be done from the downloads tab by selecting “Offline Tools”, and then selecting “GSTR-9C Offline Tool”.

Step 4: With the help of the GSTR-9C Offline Tool, the following steps may be done to prepare the GSTR-9C:-

1. Open the GSTR Offline Utility Worksheet and then feed in the relevant data into the tables on the worksheet.
2. To then view the draft version of Form GSTR-9C, the preview PDF file has to be generated.
3. Once this is done, the JSON file can be generated.

How to upload the GSTR-9C JSON file on the GST portal?

In order to upload the JSON file that was generated-

Step 1: The taxpayer will need to login to the GST portal using the GSTR-9C Offline Utility. 
Step 2: Once the login is successful, the taxpayer shall select “Annual Return” under ‘Returns’ tab, select the appropriate financial year and then click on search.

Step 3: User can make any edits/changes in the GSTR-9C form before clicking on the “Proceed to File” button. Whenever users make changes, they must re-generate the JSON file and again upload the same through the GSTR-9C offline utility.

Note: If the JSON file displays errors during the upload, the taxpayer can download the Error Report, make the necessary corrections and then upload the updated JSON file.

Steps to file the form GSTR-9C on the GST portal

Step 1: Once the generated JSON file is uploaded on the GST portal, the user may then proceed towards adding the financial statements such as the balance sheet, profit and loss statement and other necessary documents after the necessary verification.

Step 2: The documents to be uploaded must be uploaded in PDF format. The file size limit is 5 MB per file and a maximum of 2 files can be uploaded in each section.

Step 3: At the time of uploading the necessary documents, the “SAVE” button must be clicked on after the upload of each document which shows the status as “Processed”. If the “SAVE” button is not clicked with each upload, an error message will be displayed if the user clicks on “PROCEED TO FILE”.

Step 4: The “PROCEED TO FILE” button will be enabled only once the following documents are successfully uploaded:

• Generated JSON file
• Balance Sheet in the PDF format
• Profit and Loss Account in the PDF Format

Step 5: The user can choose to view the draft of the GSTR-9C by clicking on the “PREVIEW DRAFT GSTR-9C (PREVIEW)” button.

Step 6: Clicking on the “PROCEED TO FILE” button will then take the user to the verification page. Once the verification details are confirmed, the “FILE GSTR-9C” button will be enabled, indicating that it is the final step where the form is ready to be filed once the user clicks on it.

Step 7: Once it is successfully filed, the user can always track it by going to the “Services” tab on the GST Portal and selecting “Returns” from the dropdown list and then selecting the “View Filed Returns” option.

If you are facing any errors while generating or uploading a GSTR-9C JSON file or filing GSTR-9C, please refer to our article on ‘List of JSON errors in GSTR-9C filing & Solutions’ to get the solutions for the same.