Waiting for income tax refund? Government has this warning for you
2 min read 04 Aug 2023, 01:42 PM ISTTax refund scam messages are circulating after the July deadline for income tax return filing in India.
PremiumIncome tax refund: If you have received a message claiming an income tax refund of ₹XXXXX amount has been approved and you need to verify or update your bank account. Beware! This is a fake message, please do not bother to respond to any such messages.
A new phishing scam in the name of an ‘income tax refund’ message is doing the rounds. As the income tax return (ITR) filing July deadline ended, scamsters are trying to trap people with fake income tax refund messages.
The government’s official fact-checker, PIB FactCheck alerted people against fake messages regarding income tax refund. “Dear Sir, You have been approved for an income tax refund of ₹15,490/-, the amount will be credited to your account shortly. Please verify your account number 5XXXXX6755. If this is not correct, please update your bank account information by visiting the link below. https://bit.ly/20wpYK6", read the tweet.
Calling this as fake, PIB Fact Check said the income tax department has not sent this message. One should beware of such scams and refrain from sharing your personal information.
How taxpayers receive income tax refunds
The income tax refunds are sent directly to the pre-validated bank accounts provided by taxpayers at the time of filing returns. The tax department will never ask taxpayers to provide bank account details or update or verify them through messages. They will not request personal information, such as PINs or passwords through email.
“As per the press release by the income tax department 61% of e-verified returns have already been processed - which means an intimation for processing, refund, or adjustment whichever applies must have been sent out, and refund due if any is usually credited between 10 days to 2 weeks after processing," said Archit Gupta, Founder and CEO, Clear.
July 31 was the last date for filing income tax returns by salaried taxpayers. A record 6.77 crore income tax returns for the assessment year 2023-24 were filed till the due date. "The total number of ITRs for AY 2023-24 filed till 31st July 2023 are more than 6.77 crore, which is 16.1 per cent more than the total ITRs for AY 2022-23 (5.83 crore) filed till 31st July 2022," the income tax department said in a statement. Out of the 6.77 crore ITRs filed for AY 2023-24, 49.18 per cent are ITR-1 (3.33 crore), 11.97 per cent are ITR-2 (81.12 lakh), 11.13 per cent are ITR-3 (75.40 lakh), 26.77 per cent are ITR-4 (1.81 crore) and 0.94 per cent are ITR-5 to 7 (6.40 lakh).
