Every Quarter, Without Exception — That Is What TDS Compliance Means — The TDS return is not a filing you handle once. It runs four times a year. The schedule does not shift. The dates are 31 July, 31 October, 31 January, 31 May. Miss Q3, filed in January for October to December deductions, and Section 234E levies ₹1,000 per day from the due date until the return is filed. Miss the challan deposit on time. That is the 7th of the following month for salary. It is the 7th or 14th for non-salary. Interest under Section 201(1A) accrues. These are not edge cases. For a business with ten employees and fifteen contractors, a quarter's worth of TDS activity involves hundreds of line items. Any one of which — a wrong PAN, a mismatched challan serial — can block a deductee's TDS credit for months.
FinTax24 handles the complete quarterly cycle. We compile TDS and TCS deducted. We reconcile challan 281. We prepare Form 24Q (salary), Form 26Q (non-salary), Form 27Q (foreign remittance under Section 195), and Form 27EQ (TCS). We handle TRACES validation, upload, and DSC-based filing. The ₹1,999 per quarter rate covers 24Q and 26Q. Form 27Q and 27EQ are charged separately.
The Reconciliation Step Most Businesses Skip — and Why It Costs Them
Form 26Q requires matching every deductee PAN against every challan 281 entry. This is not a formality. TRACES validates each row. If the PAN is wrong, or the challan serial number does not match what the NSDL database holds, the entry is marked invalid. The TDS credit is frozen for that deductee. When the deductee files their own ITR and finds their TDS credit missing, they will claim it from the deductor. The deductor then has to file a correction. They wait for it to be processed. They re-issue the certificate. This chain can take two to four months.
A Bhavnagar engineering firm discovered this. Their main contractor's Form 16A showed TDS credit of ₹87,000. The contractor could not find it in his 26AS. The contractor's PAN had been entered correctly in the books. It had been entered incorrectly in the challan 281. A digit was transposed in the challan serial number. The correction took eleven weeks to process. FinTax24 avoids this by running a full 26Q reconciliation before filing. Every PAN is validated. Every challan is matched. Every mismatch is flagged and corrected before the return goes to TRACES.
Form 24Q and Form 16 — What Happens After the Return Is Filed
Form 24Q is the quarterly salary TDS return. Its companion obligation is Form 16. This is the annual TDS certificate issued to each employee by 15 June of the assessment year. Form 16 is what employees use to claim TDS credit in their own ITR. If the Q4 Form 24Q is filed late, Form 16 is late. If Form 16 is wrong — wrong PAN, wrong periods, wrong TDS amount — every employee's ITR is wrong. FinTax24 tracks the entire chain from quarterly filing through annual certificate issuance. We ensure each deadline is met in sequence.
Section 197 Certificates, Lower TDS Deductions, and Advance Planning
Contractors and professionals who expect their income to be below the threshold often apply for a lower or nil TDS certificate under Section 197. If the certificate is obtained but the challan is prepared at the full rate, the excess TDS has to be reclaimed through the deductee's ITR. It cannot be reclaimed in the deductor's return. FinTax24 checks for any live Section 197 certificates at the start of each quarter. We apply the correct rate before the challan is prepared.
The ₹1,999 per quarter covers the full filing and reconciliation. Additional charges apply only if correction rounds are required. They also apply if the quarter involves Form 27Q (DTAA treaty rate application, Form 15CB coordination) or Form 27EQ (TCS on sale of goods, scrap, or motor vehicles under Chapter XVII-BB).