'Dependence on GSTN APIs is posing as a problem in taking our products to taxpayers'

Swaminathan S, Founder and CEO, IRIS Business Services

As a GSP and ASP (Application Service Provider), IRIS is providing an end to end solution called IRIS GST that will take care of all the filing needs of taxpayers, right from user management and data upload to return preparation and filing. In phase 1, IRIS GST is a web based solution that incorporates several features to make transactions efficient and convenient for taxpayers, including a dynamic workflow engine, automated reporting and summary dashboards. In phase 2, we are planning to develop a mobile app to facilitate some of these activities.

We are happy to report that IRIS GST is the most active in terms of testing our application rigorously. We have topped the list and this is entirely a reflection of our commitment to providing a best of breed solution to filers. These numbers clearly show our product readiness, relentless focus on quality, and the testing efforts being put in by our GST subject-matter experts and software testers.

We see some concerns in implementing GST from July 1 – Apart from the large corporates, there is a general lack of awareness among the small corporates/SME segment on GST, its impact on their business and how to go about GST compliance. This will mean that come July 1, not everyone will be ready to hit the ground running. GST’s two-way matching process means that it’s not enough only for the large corporates to be GST-ready, their entire supply chain, in some cases comprising of smaller vendors/suppliers, needs to fall in line as well. The other challenge for us specifically as a GSP is the dependence on GSTN APIs – for example, the recent changes in return formats means that new APIs will need to be released by GSTN. This increases the time for our own product to be fully ready and tested. Other ASPs and GSPs might be facing similar challenges which will in turn result in a larger delay in taking our products to taxpayers.

We have over a 50 member team in IRIS who have been trained on GST. We also have a team of partners including Chartered Accountants and Indirect Tax experts on the domain side. Together we have trained several corporates on GST in face to face meetings as well as online sessions.

We are targeting the corporate segment, primarily medium to large corporates.