July 31 – the due date for filing income tax returns for the financial year 2023-24 (assessment year 2024-25) – is drawing closer.

If you are a salaried tax-payer and have not yet received your Form-16, you can still take the first steps towards filing returns by getting all your documents in order – primarily your Form 26AS, that is the tax credit statement, Annual Information Statement (AIS), capital gain and bank statements.

Why check Form 26AS and AIS

Both Form 26AS and the Annual Information Statement can be downloaded through the Income Tax portal (incometax.gov.in). If you haven’t registered already, you can do so now before commencing the process. Your Permanent Account Number (PAN) will be your user ID.

Through Form 26AS, you will be able to view details of property purchases and high-value financial transactions executed during the year besides tax deducted at source (TDS) and tax collected at source (TCS) deposited with the income tax department by deductors such as employers and banks.

AIS is an extension of Form 26AS, which provides a more extensive and comprehensive look at your taxes deducted and paid as well as other financial transactions. For instance, it will display details of tax refunds, savings account interest or dividend earned, rent received, purchase and sale transactions of securities, immovable properties, foreign remittances and so on.

Studying these two statements will ensure that you do not, inadvertently or otherwise, omit any financial transactions that are liable to tax. You will be able to identify the sources of income where tax has been deducted, which will allow you to claim credit against such deductions.

Keep an eye on specified financial transactions

You need to be particularly alert while reconciling the details of high-value financial transactions (SFT) that you may have carried out during the year with the data in Form 26AS. For example, the statement will display cash deposits of over Rs 10 lakh in your savings accounts in a financial year or purchase of property worth over Rs 30 lakh. Any discrepancy on these counts that goes unrectified can lead to tax notices in future.

Flag mismatch, get discrepancies resolved

A comparison of your Form-16, income statements and bank interest certificates, among other things, can help you detect any mismatch between data on transactions and tax deducted in Form 26AS, AIS and your records. Do not ignore any discrepancies and these could trigger queries and even notices from the income-tax department.

Now, it is not possible to get your grievances around Form 26AS mismatches resolved through the I-T portal. You will have to approach your tax deductor (for instance, employer or bank) or collector to get the errors rectified. Since these tasks can be time-consuming, it is best to commence the return-filing process well in advance so that you have time to complete the reconciliation and rectification, if needed.

Tap AIS to get complaints redressed swiftly

AIS comes with a built-in grievance redressal mechanism. To avail this facility online, you need to first log in to the income tax e-filing portal and access the statement. Once you open it, you can verify the information and provide your feedback should you find errors.

To raise a dispute on any figures mentioned in Part B of the statement (which contains income, TDS, SFT details, etc), you need to click ‘Bulk feedback’, select the specific transaction where you have spotted the error, and then click on ‘Continue’. Under the ‘Feedback type’ dropdown menu, select the appropriate grounds of complaint and hit ‘Submit’. If your argument is accepted, AIS will then reflect the value reported by the dedcutors as well as data modified after your feedback.

If details of your income and taxation as per Form-16, bank statements tally with your Form 26AS and AIS, your path to quick and error-free ITR filing will become clearer.