GST refund disposal instructions require officers to secure missing hard copies, ensure timely processing, and maintain review accountability.
Top priority is to be given to disposal of GST refund applications filed in RFD-01. Where refund applications have been uploaded on the GST portal but the hard copy has not been submitted in office, the concerned jurisdictional officer must personally contact the taxpayer, obtain the hard copy, resolve any difficulty in filing it, and process the application for disposal in accordance with rules. Jurisdictional officers must complete this exercise by 31.07.2018, and the Zonal Additional Commissioner, Grade-1 must review receipt of hard copies and forward reports to headquarters. Assessing officers and Zonal Additional Commissioners are made personally responsible for timely disposal and monitoring.

Registration and manifest obligations require authorised sea carriers to file prescribed arrival/departure manifests and secure bonds for transhipment.
The Regulations require persons delivering arrival or departure manifests to register with the jurisdictional Commissioner in Form I for defined terms, prescribe formats and contents of manifests including separate sheets for specific cargo (notably radioactive material), permit amendment by proper officers absent fraudulent intent, and condition transhipment and coastal transit on manifest inclusion and execution of specified bonds with or without guarantee. Commissioners may suspend or revoke an authorised carrier's registration for specified reasons, penalties may be imposed for contraventions, and appeal remedies are available under the statute.

Town of Export Excellence designation: Panipat notified for carpets, textile floor coverings and bed linen under amendment.
Amendment to Appendix 1B designates Panipat as a Town of Export Excellence for carpets, other textile floor coverings and bed linen, adding an entry to Appendix 1B by Public Notice and thereby notifying Panipat's recognition for export promotion of those product categories.

Appointment of Senior Joint Commissioners (Appeals) authorises designated commissioners to exercise appellate GST functions within jurisdiction.
Authorises designated Senior Joint Commissioners posted at Circles, Ranges, Central Sections and Bureau of Investigation Units to act as Senior Joint Commissioner (Appeals) under the Goods and Services Tax legislation, within their respective jurisdictions, pursuant to sub section (3) of section 5 read with clause (8) of section 2 and rules made thereunder; this partial modification of earlier orders is stated to be effective from 15 November 2017.

Authorised Officer designation under FSS Act enables named customs officers to clear imported food at Kandla port.
Notification designates two named customs superintendents as Authorised Officers under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 for clearance of imported food consignments at Deen Dayal Port, Kandla and the specified terminal within its jurisdiction, and provides their office address and contact details to implement FSSAI's import-control and clearance responsibilities at that port.

Extension of return filing due date under section 119, shifting the statutory deadline for specified taxpayers.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes, under Section 119 of the Income-tax Act, 1961, extends the due date for filing income-tax returns for specified categories of taxpayers for assessment year 2018-19. The order changes the deadline prescribed by Section 139(1) from 31st July, 2018 to 31st August, 2018, issued as an administrative Order by the Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance.

RFID one-time seals mandated for bonded warehouse movements, requiring ISO compliant seals, certified vendors, and data capture.
Extension of mandatory use of RFID tamper-proof one-time-locks (RFID OTL) for deposit into and removal from customs bonded warehouses requires seals conforming to ISO standards, unique serials and vendor branding, vendor certification submitted to Risk Management Division, deployment of prescribed readers, and capture/upload of specified data elements (IEC, document numbers, RFID OTL number, sealing date/time, container/vehicle identifiers, warehouse and customs location codes). Licencees must procure readers and seals, vendors must link TID to warehouse codes, and scanned trip reports will serve as arrival acknowledgements; tampering triggers examination or refusal to unload.

Duty credit scrips: amendment permits debit for import of items previously excluded under Appendix provisions of trade policy.
The Director General, under paragraph 1.03 of the Foreign Trade Policy 2015-2020, deleted items at serial numbers 01-07 from the Appendix to the Merchandise Exports from India Scheme, with immediate effect. As a result, duty credit scrips issued under Chapter 3 of MEIS may now be debited for import of items that were earlier excluded by those Appendix entries, thereby expanding procedural eligibility for utilisation of export-linked duty credits in import transactions.

Information sharing under section 138 requires income-tax authorities to furnish specified investigation and assessment summaries to CEIB.
CBDT directs specified income-tax authorities, under section 138(1)(a), to furnish preliminary search reports, summaries of survey/appraisal reports, summaries of assessment and appellate orders in cases searched/surveyed by DGIT(Investigation), and prosecution details to the Director General, CEIB. Each specified authority must form the opinion that such furnishing is necessary for CEIB functions, and the Investigation Division of CBDT will manage the protocol for information transmission.

Authorised officer designation for GST practitioner enrolment assigns territorial responsibility and requires compliance with GSTN guidelines.
Delegation of authority to process enrolment applications for Goods and Services Tax Practitioners under the Assam GST Act, 2017 to specified Joint Commissioners of State Tax, each assigned defined territorial jurisdictions; officers must act subject to the Act and rules and follow GSTN guidelines.

Registration requirement under Sea Cargo Manifest Regulations: carriers must register or renew to transact; non-registration bars operations.
Sea Cargo Manifest and Transshipment Regulations, 2018 come into force and supersede earlier manifest and transportation regulations; stakeholders including Steamer Agents, Main Line Operators, Liners and authorized carriers must apply for registration or renew existing registration in the prescribed form under Regulation 3, and failure to register will bar them from transacting business under the Regulations, with the office to be informed of any compliance difficulties.

Electronic sealing requirements for customs bonded warehouses mandate compliance for deposit and removal of goods and reporting implementation issues.
Electronic sealing is mandated for the deposit into and removal of goods from customs bonded warehouses pursuant to Board Circular No. 19/2018, directing customs brokers, exporters, importers and other trade stakeholders to adopt electronic seals to secure consignments and comply with procedural requirements, with stakeholders asked to report implementation difficulties to the issuing office.

Deemed export benefits: refund of terminal excise duty permitted for supplies to JICA funded projects made before the policy change.
DGFT has directed that, in relaxation of para 8.3(c) of FTP 2009-14, refund of Terminal Excise Duty shall be allowed where TED exemption under excise notifications was unavailable for supplies made under ICB to projects funded by JICA and other agencies notified in DGFT Public Notice No.67, provided those supplies qualify under para 8.2(d) of FTP 2009-14 and were made up to the earlier policy cut-off; Regional Authorities must dispose pending claims accordingly.

One-to-one correlation between duty-free precious metal imports and exports not required; agencies must maintain accurate records.
Nominated agencies importing duty free gold, silver or platinum under the Export Against Supply scheme need not establish a one to one correlation between each imported consignment and exported jewellery; instead they must maintain proper records showing that duty free metal has been used in the manufacture of exported jewellery or articles and clearly account for duty free versus duty paid metal to demonstrate compliance with the exemption and export obligation.

Reward scheme for tax recovery extended to informers and officers, enabling discretionary payments for actionable intelligence.
Rewards are extended to informers and government servants for information that leads to recovery of arrears from tax defaulters; informers' names will be kept confidential. The Chief Commissioner may authorize rewards only after departmental efforts to trace defaulters have been exhausted and the information is shown to have been instrumental in recovery. The reward quantum is discretionary, guided by the nature and efficacy of the information, and capped as per the scheme. Officer rewards require Reward Committee satisfaction that recovery was pending after finality or the unit was nonfunctioning, with no appeal pending, and follow existing allocation policies.

Reward scheme for informers extended to tax recovery cases; informers and officers may receive discretionary rewards subject to conditions.
Extension of the reward scheme allows payment to informers who provide actionable intelligence on defaulters' assets and to government servants whose efforts result in recovery. Rewards require Chief Commissioner satisfaction that departmental tracing efforts were exhausted and that the information led to recovery. The reward may be up to 5% of the amount recovered, determined by the information's nature, accuracy and efficacy. Informer-initiated cases draw from the informer reward pool under existing policy. Officers may receive rewards for extraordinary post-adjudication recoveries subject to Reward Committee approval and applicable upper limits for post-investigation work.

Classification of Tramadol as a psychotropic substance: delayed applicability for licensed manufacturers, importers and exporters after grace period.
The amendment defers the operational applicability of Tramadol's classification as a psychotropic substance so that licensed manufacturers, importers and exporters are subject to the notification only after the expiry of a prescribed grace period following publication; the earlier public notice is amended accordingly and Customs staff are to treat this Public Notice as a Standing Order.

Goods and Services Tax reforms approved: law amendments, new return formats, appellate tribunal, IGST rule change, and rate adjustments.
The Council ratified recent central and pari materia State notifications, expanded ITGRC remit and extended migration and TRAN filing deadlines; approved legislative amendments to CGST/IGST/UTGST/Compensation Acts with specified drafting changes (including retrospective amendment to Section 7 and an enabling provision for Special Category States' registration thresholds); constituted GSTAT with a national and three regional benches; approved the new return design (monthly return; SAHAJ and SUGAM quarterly returns with monthly payment, eligibility up to Rs. 5 crore) targeted for January 2019; adopted multiple rate changes and exemptions as per Fitment recommendations, and directed IGST cross utilisation change plus establishment of a CBIC led committee to address IGST apportionment and balances.

Exporters must correct EGM errors to enable Shipping Bill migration and receipt of IGST refund to bank accounts.
EGM filing errors (SB002, SB006) and invoice errors (SB005) prevent Shipping Bills from migrating from the IGST Temporary Scroll to the Final Scroll, blocking IGST refund credit. Exporters must ensure correct EGM filing before flight departure, submit reconciliation documents (GSTR 1/Table 6A, GSTR 3B and a Concordance Table) and send rectification details to the IGST Refund Cell (Airport) for processing.

IGST refund clearance fortnight to expedite processing of pending export refund claims and assist exporters.
A public notice announces a dedicated IGST refund clearance fortnight at the Air Cargo Complex, NSCBI to expedite liquidation of pending IGST refund claims and assist exporters and export organizations in getting refund claims processed, with difficulties to be reported to the Assistant Commissioner of Customs, Drawback & IGST Refund Section.