The article explains the intricacies related to e-Sewa. It makes the readers understand the process of availing e-Sewa online in India.

Electronic Sewa, in short, e-sewa facility, is a form of electronic service offered by the government to provide faster and more efficient services to the citizens of India. It includes issuing all types of certificates related to the citizens like birth/death certificates, marriage certificates, income tax certificates, etc., receiving all sorts of bill payments, and addressing public grievances.

You can even use the e-Sewa wallet to do online or offline shopping, transfer funds from one bank to another, make payments on your bills including your internet bill, school/college fees, credit card bills, buy train/flight tickets, buy movie tickets and many other monetary transactions without facing any problem.

The e-sewa facility offers many facilities for Employee Provident Fund submission with a complete paperless submission procedure. It allows you to register yourself in a very simple manner. Once you get your e-Sewa login ID, your registered mobile number, online login password, and M-Pin (Mobile Personal Identification Number), you can pay in your EPF account.

Using the e-sewa facility, you can file your income tax return too, termed as e-Filing or electronic filing of return. It prevents you from going to the Income Tax Department to submit your IT returns. This process of submitting tax returns with the help of the internet, using tax preparation software that the concerned tax department has preapproved, is called e-Return.

How you can download the e-Return tool using e-Sewa:

The e-Return submission was introduced in EPFO (Employee Provident Fund Organization) in 2010. Though initially, it was not mandatory, from the assessment year 2010-13, e-Return has become mandatory for all the registered taxpayers whose income is taxable. It includes for the employer or partnership firm to file the return of income irrespective of the amount of income or loss.  However, paper filing is also available in some specific cases where the returnees are above 80 years old with no professional income from any regular business.

The e-Return facilities provide accuracy in filing within the minimum time limit, making it more reliable nowadays. It also helps calculate any dues in all accounts and restrictions regarding pension contribution to the EPF account by the employees.

If you are interested in availing e-sewa facility, it is better to follow the following steps. It is important to understand that a step-by-step approach can help the applicant gain the maximum advantage.

1. First visit the website of EPFO: The first step of downloading the e-Return tool is to visit the website of EPFO.
2. Click on the e-Return tab: Once you reach the website, please click on the e-Return tab.
3. Download the required software: In order to download the e-Return tool, you have to download some of the software components like crystal report 10_5, a word processor software developed by SAP, DotNetfx35, and Windows Installer 3_5. The last two components are Microsoft Installer used for software installation, maintenance, and removal.
4. Download links: On the same page, two e-Return tool download links are available for two versions of the tool. These are e-Return tool version 5.0 and e-Return version 6.1. Note: Version 5.0 does not cover the changes for those who join on or after 1st September 2014 with salaries over ₹15,000. It only takes care of those whose wages are below ₹15,000.
5. Check the “Help Files and Instructions Files” box: A proper guideline is available under the “Help Files and Instructions Files” box, which helps you by providing.

• User Manual,
• Instructions for Installations,
• Instructions for using the new version 6.0.
• Changes made in version 5.0.
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs).

Once the download part is over, now you have to make use of it. Now, to begin with, you need to check the below-mentioned process:

• You must first add the company name and other necessary details for filing the return. You will get a unique and only numeric code for your company.
• Select the office where you are going to submit the return. The region and office code will get selected automatically.
• Enter your pre-assigned unique numeric code. If the extension is allotted, you have to field that too, or else just leave that blank and press the add button.
• You will get a confirmation message once your company details have been added. At this point, your code number and extension are now merged by EPFO, and you are provided with a 15-digit establishment ID.
• Now select your establishment code from the dropdown list and click the “open” tab to start filing your company’s returns.

Advantages of Using the e-Sewa Portal for Employers

The e-Sewa portal comes up with many advantages for employers in our country. The employers could work towards a paperless EPF procedure that is very cost-effective. Since everything is taken care of digitally and over the internet, making errors is also reduced.

• Employers no more require physical submission. Everything is getting sorted over the internet, which empowers them in more productive usage of the workforce.
• Once the returns get filed, the employers used to get a notification over their registered mobile number with a text message stating the process is being successfully completed.
• EPF contributions of the employees are getting deposited every month automatically. Employers do not have to worry about the problem of missing deadlines for submission and face the possible consequences.
• It also helps the employers with annual accounts documents available under the online data section. So, if needed, any of the previous year’s files can be checked for any present-day reference. So, there is a great relief for the employers against possible data losses.
• Suppose any employees are looking for any particular month’s pay slip. In that case, a notification can be sent to the employers, who can generate that pay slip based on the annual accounts document available in the portal.

Conclusion

Electronic Sewa has been a recently included service promoted by the Government of India. With e-Sewa, all the citizens of India can avail the opportunity of information verification regarding provident funds that are also online. However, it is important to know the procedural intricacies to avail of necessary benefits. To know more about the process, you can contact the experts from Edu-Visor.