By IANS
New Delhi : To help exporters tide over the crisis on account of the rising rupee, they will get refund of service tax for three more services used by them — general insurance, technical testing and inspection and certification.
“Government has issued a notification, extending refund of service tax paid by exporters on additional three taxable services, which are not in the nature of input services but can be linked to exports,” an official statement said.
Last month, the finance ministry decided to refund the service tax paid by the exporters for port, road transport and rail services.
The government had been collecting a 12-percent service tax and an additional cess of three percent on these services.
Commerce Minister Kamal Nath had promised to waive these taxes during the annual review of India’s foreign trade policy in April and the finance ministry finally notified the order Monday, officials said.
Exporters are already eligible for service tax exemption for some input services — like those of solicitors and chartered accountants — that are used for export.
The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Assocham) said these measures would yield results at an appropriate time.
“Exporters will be beneficiaries of refund schemes on services and provision to pay interest on exchange earners foreign currency balances will also amount to their overall commercial interests,” the chamber said in a statement.
The government had earlier decided to provide two-percent interest as fiscal sops in areas like textiles, garments, leather goods, handicraft, engineering goods, processed agriculture products, marine products and sports goods.