If you pay more tax than she is liable for in a financial year through excess tax deducted at source (TDS) or miscalculation in income tax, the income tax department refunds the excess amount. The refund is processed after the taxpayer files and verifies her income tax return (ITR).
The refund is credited into the assessee’s bank account provided at the time of filing ITR.
However, if your bank account is not pre-validated on the income tax portal, you will not get the outstanding income tax refund as tax refunds are credited only to those bank accounts which are linked with PAN and are also pre-validated on the Income Tax e-filing website. With the new income tax return filing website, you can easily check whether your bank account is pre-validated or not. In case it is not, you can pre-validate it easily using a few steps.
How to check if the bank account is pre-validated:
- Log in to your account on the Income Tax portal
- Click on the My Profile option and then select My Bank Account.
- On the screen, you will see bank accounts, which are pre-validated. The bank account selected for receiving an income tax refund on your behalf will also be displayed. In case none of the accounts is pre-validated, you can follow a series of simple steps to pre-validate it to receive refunds.
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How to Pre-validate Bank Account:
- Login into your account on the new Income Tax Portal
- Select the My Profile option by clicking on your name
- Select ‘My Bank Account’ and then select ‘Add Bank Account’.
- Fill in the details like Bank Account Number, Account Type, Account Holder Type, IFSC
- Once the IFSC details are added, the bank name and bank branch details will be automatically added (Cross check the details)
- You will also see the mobile number and email address linked to your bank account on the screen
- Click on the ‘Validate’ option
Once successfully validated, your bank account will be automatically added to your profile. You can then nominate the account on the e-filing portal to get an income tax refund. To check whether the account is pre-validated or not, click on the three dots on the right side of the box showing the name of the bank, then select View Bank Details.
A pop-up box will appear on the screen. It will contain information such as when the request for validation was submitted, whether the bank account is validated or not, and the date on which it has been pre-validated.