New income tax e-filing portal 2021: Check new features, payment system and more

The Income Tax Department is shortly going to launch the much anticipated e-filing portal. The existing web portal has been currently under a "blackout period" of six days till June 6. The new e-filing link -- www.Incometax.Gov.In -- will replace the HYPERLINK "http://existing www.Incometaxindiaefiling.Gov.In". The mobile app will also be released subsequent to the initial launch of the portal, to enable taxpayers to get familiar with the various features. The new Income Tax website will be coming out with the following features:

The upcoming website will enable a new online tax payment system with multiple new payment options using net banking, UPI, credit card and RTGS/NEFT from any account of taxpayer in any bank, for easy payment of taxes.

The new taxpayer-friendly portal is integrated with immediate processing of Income Tax Returns (ITRs) to issue quick refunds to taxpayers and all interactions and uploads or pending actions will be displayed on a single dashboard for follow-up action by the taxpayer.

It will also have a free ITR preparation software with interactive questions to help taxpayers to file ITRs 1, 4 (online and offline) and ITR 2 (offline) to begin with and the facility for preparation of ITRs 3, 5, 6, 7 will be made available shortly.

Taxpayers will be able to proactively update their profile to provide certain details of income including salary, house property, business/profession which will be used in pre-filling their ITR in the new web port.

Detailed enablement of pre-filling with salary income, interest, dividend and capital gains will be available after TDS (tax deducted at source) and SFT (statement of financial transaction) statements are uploaded (due date June 30, 2021).

A new call center for taxpayer assistance for prompt response to taxpayer queries is also planned and the portal will have detailed FAQs, user manuals, videos and chatbot/live agent also. Functionalities for filing income tax forms, add tax professionals, submit responses to notices in faceless scrutiny or appeals would be available.