A return that was never filed does not stay quiet. It surfaces when a Bengaluru founder opens a data room and the investor asks for three years of filed returns. It surfaces when a landlord in HSR Layout wants proof of income before handing over keys. And it surfaces when a refund sitting in your name stops being claimable because the window shut. Filing is the cheap part of this. Rebuilding a year you skipped, from bank statements and broker reports pulled long after the fact, is not.
What happens when the return is late, wrong or never filed?
A late fee lands under section 234F. It is ₹5,000 where total income crosses ₹5 lakh, and ₹1,000 where it does not, and interest runs separately on tax you still owe. Miss the belated window as well and capital losses you were counting on can no longer be carried forward. That costs more than the fee ever will.
Wrong is worse than late. Pick the wrong form and the return comes back defective, so you refile inside a deadline you have already spent. Report a figure that does not match your Annual Information Statement and the query arrives months later, usually about interest income or a share sale nobody remembered. We reconcile Form 26AS and the AIS before anything is submitted, because a mismatch is far easier to fix on a working file than in a reply to a notice. If you want the countrywide rules first, start with our complete return filing guide for India.
Which Bengaluru filers does this actually catch?
Companies, LLPs and partnership firms file every year whether or not they earned anything. For individuals the trigger is income above the basic exemption, plus any year you want a refund back or a loss carried forward. In practice these are the Bengaluru filers who reach us:
- A founder whose HSR Layout product startup has just made its first ten hires. The company files, the founder files, and payroll has now picked up a Karnataka professional tax deduction.
- An IT services and BPM operator in Electronic City with contractor payouts, export invoices and a tax audit to sit under.
- A salaried engineer in Whitefield who changed jobs in November and holds two Form 16s, each of which gave a full basic exemption.
- A consultant in Indiranagar billing on monthly retainer and filing under presumptive taxation.
- An employee anywhere in the city who sold vested shares in a secondary and now has capital gains to report.
Which department ends up holding your file?
Income tax is central law. A Bengaluru address does not give you a different due date, a different form, a different portal or a softer assessment, and nothing is filed at a counter.
What is genuinely local is the second tax file that Bengaluru businesses forget. Karnataka professional tax is administered by the Karnataka Commercial Taxes Department and everything runs on e-Prerana at ptax.karnataka.gov.in. If you carry a GST registration too, that application is assigned to either a Karnataka state officer or a central officer, and either can raise clarifications and verify the principal place of business. A Karnataka GST registration number carries the state's own two digit code at the front, and we confirm the number the department issues you.
Which dates govern the year?
| Filing or payment | Statutory date | Who it binds |
|---|---|---|
| Income tax return, no audit | 31 July | Salaried filers, consultants, small firms |
| Income tax return, audit cases | 31 October | Companies, LLPs and audited businesses |
| Belated or revised return | 31 December | Anyone who missed the date or misfiled |
| Payment on the professional tax enrolment certificate | 30 April | Every EC holder in Karnataka |
| Employer statement in Form 5-A | 20th of the next month | Every RC holder running a payroll |
Two counting rules are worth knowing. The 30 April date is the statutory one. It has been extended by separate order in three of the last four years, so we work to 30 April and check the current circular rather than assume last year's relief repeats. Where enrolment happens partway through a year, payment falls due within one month of enrolment instead.
What does the fee cover, and what sits outside it?
Filing starts at ₹999, and a straightforward return goes in within 3 to 5 days of a complete document set. That buys a chartered accountant reading your actual numbers rather than a form filler.
- We send a checklist built around your income type and collect Form 16, the AIS, Form 26AS, bank statements and broker statements.
- We compute income under both regimes, claim what you can evidence, and show you the arithmetic behind the recommendation.
- You approve the computation and the balance tax before anything moves. Nothing is submitted on your behalf without that.
- We file, send the ITR-V acknowledgement, complete e-verification with you and follow the refund until it lands.
Outside that fee: a tax audit, a reply to a departmental notice, a revised return once an assessment has begun, and bookkeeping for a business that keeps none. Those are quoted separately, and always before we start.
Where does Karnataka professional tax sit next to the return?
Right beside it, and it is the item Bengaluru filers most often get wrong. Karnataka uses two certificates rather than one. What you owe on your own account runs through an enrolment certificate, the EC. What you withhold from staff salaries runs through a registration certificate, the RC. A Bengaluru company with employees needs both, while a solo consultant with none needs only the EC.
The payroll line is a monthly salary of ₹25,000 and above, and the schedule says "and above", so somebody drawing exactly that figure is inside the net. Eleven months carry ₹200 each, April to January plus March, and February carries ₹300, so the year totals ₹2,500. Every other entry in the Karnataka schedule sits at ₹2,500 a year too. So a company registered under the Companies Act that also holds a Karnataka GST registration pays that amount once, not twice. A second office in the city counts as a separate person and pays its own ₹2,500. Space kept only as a godown for storing goods does not.
For the return itself this matters twice over. Under the old regime the professional tax deducted from salary is allowed against salary income, and under the new regime it is not, which nudges the regime comparison for a Bengaluru employee. And a business preparing its first return often discovers it never applied for the certificates at all, which draws a penalty of ₹1,000 for an employer and ₹500 for anyone else, imposed after a hearing.
Why should your income tax return come to LegalX India?
Because the return is only half the file. Our CA and CS team files the income tax return, checks the professional tax position sitting behind it on e-Prerana, and reads a payroll the way a Karnataka employer has to read it. The work is done online, for clients from HSR Layout to Electronic City to Jayanagar, with documents shared digitally and no office visit needed. You deal with one person who knows your file instead of a queue. Filing starts at ₹999 and a clean return is done in 3 to 5 days.