May 042015
 

TDS on withdrawal of fund from Employees Provident Fund

Meaning of Recognized Provident Fund

Under the Employees Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952 (EPF & MP Act, 1952), certain specified employers are required to comply with the Employees Provident Fund Scheme, 1952 (EPFS). However, these employers are also permitted to establish and manage their own private provident fund (PF) scheme subject to fulfillment of certain conditions.

The provident funds established under a scheme framed under EPF & MP Act, 1952 or Provident Fund exempted under section 17 of the said Act and recognised under the Income-tax Act are termed as Recognised Provident fund (RPF) under the Act.

System of taxation of RPF

Under existing rule of income tax act, the withdrawal of accumulated balance by an employee from the RPF is exempt from taxation.

However, if the employee makes withdrawal before continuous service of five years (other than the cases of termination due to ill health, closure of business, etc.) and does not opt for transfer of accumulated balance to new employer same is taxable.

Computation of income for TDS

For ensuring collection of tax in respect of these withdrawals, rule 10 of Schedule IV-A provides that the trustees of the RPF, at the time of payment, shall deduct tax as computed in rule 9 of Schedule IV-A.

Rule 9 of Schedule IV-A of the Act provides that the tax on withdrawn amount is required to be calculated by re-computing the tax liability of the years for which the contribution to RPF has been made by treating the same as contribution to unrecognized provident fund.

Existing difficulty

However, at times, it is not possible for the trustees of EPFS to get the information regarding taxability of the employee such as year-wise amount of taxable income and tax payable for the purposes of computation of the amount of tax liability under rule 9 of the Schedule-IV-A of the Act.

Amendment made in Finance Act 2015

It is, therefore, proposed to insert a new provision in Act for deduction of tax at the rate of 10% on pre-mature taxable withdrawal from EPFS.

Highlights of amendment:

  • For benefiting employees having taxable income below the taxable limit, a threshold limit of Rs.30,000/- for applicability of this proposed provision is provided in the act.
  • For reducing the compliance burden of employees further, the facility of filing self-declaration for non-deduction of tax under section 197A of the Act shall be extended to the employees receiving pre-mature withdrawal.
  • An employee can give a declaration in Form No. 15G to the effect that his total income including taxable pre-mature withdrawal from EPFS does not exceed the maximum amount not chargeable to tax and on furnishing of such declaration, no tax will be deducted by the trustee of EPFS while making the payment to such employee
  • Similar facility of filing self-declaration in Form No. 15H for non-deduction of tax under section 197A of the Act shall also be extended to the senior citizen employees receiving pre-mature withdrawal.
  • However, some employees making pre-mature withdrawal may be paying tax at higher slab rates (20% or 30%). Therefore, the shortfall in the actual tax liability vis-à-vis TDS is required to be paid by these employees either by requesting their new employer or through payment of advance tax / self-assessment tax.
  • For ensuring the payment of balance tax by these employees, furnishing of valid Permanent Account Number (PAN) by them to the EPFS is a prerequisite.
  • In order to ensure the collection of balance tax by employees falling under 20% or 30% slab rate, it is also proposed that non-furnishing of PAN to the EPFS for receiving these payments would attract deduction of tax at the maximum marginal rate.
  • These amendments will take effect from 1st June, 2015.

Extracts of amendments

41. After section 192 of the Income-tax Act, the following section shall be inserted with effect from the 1st day of June, 2015, namely:—

“192A. Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act, the trustees of the Employees’ Provident Fund Scheme, 1952, framed under section 5 of the Employees’ Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952 or any person authorised under the scheme to make payment of accumulated balance due to employees, shall, in a case where the accumulated balance due to an employee participating in a recognised provident fund is includible in his total income owing to the provisions of rule 8 of Part A of the Fourth Schedule not being applicable, at the time of payment of the accumulated balance due to the employee, deduct income-tax thereon at the rate of ten per cent.:

Provided that no deduction under this section shall be made where the amount of such payment or, as the case may be, the aggregate amount of such payment to the payee is less than thirty thousand rupees:

Provided further that any person entitled to receive any amount on which tax is deductible under this section shall furnish his Permanent Account Number to the person responsible for deducting such tax, failing which tax shall be deducted at the maximum marginal rate.

Sensys