A Way Bill is a receipt or a document issued by a carrier giving details and instructions relating to the shipment of a consignment of goods and the details include name of consignor, consignee, the point of origin of the consignment, its destination, and route.

Electronic Way Bill (E-Way Bill) is basically a compliance mechanism wherein by way of a digital interface the person causing the movement of goods uploads the relevant information prior to the commencement of movement of goods and generates e-way bill on the GST portal.

Purpose: E-Way Bill is a mechanism to ensure that goods being transported comply with the GST Law and is an effective tool to track movement of goods and check tax evasion.

E-Way bill under GST

1. E-Way bill is an electronic document generated on the GST portal evidencing movement of goods.

2. It has two components:

• Part A comprising of details of GSTIN of recipient, place of delivery (PIN Code), invoice or challan number and date, value of goods, HSN code, transport document number (Goods receipt number or Railway receipt number or Airway bill number or Bill of lading number) and reasons for transportation
• Part B comprising of transporter details (Vehicle number).

3. Rule 138 of CGST Rules provide that:

a) If the consignment value is more than Rs. 50,000/

b) Information is to be furnished prior to the commencement of movement of goods

c) E-Way Bill is to be issued whether the movement is in relation to a supply or for reasons other than supply

Who will generate E-Way Bill & why?

1. E-Way bill (Both Part A and Part B) is to be generated by the consignor or consignee himself if the transportation is being done in own/hired conveyance or by railways or by air or by Vessel.

2. If the goods are handed over to a transporter for transportation by road, Part A has to be filled by the Consignor or Consignee with Transporters Information and Part B with details of the Vehicle No. has to be filled by the transporter who will generate the E-Way Bill.

3. Where neither the consignor nor consignee generates the e-way bill and the value of goods is more than Rs.50,000/- it shall be the responsibility of the transporter to generate it.

4. Inter state job work - It has been provided that where goods are sent by a principal located in one State to a job worker located in any other State, the e-way bill shall be generated by the principal irrespective of the value of the consignment.

Cancellation of E-Way bill

Circumstances - Under following circumstances and E-Way Bill can

be cancelled:

a) Goods are either not transported

b) are not transported as per the details furnished in the e-way bill, Period – Within 24 hours of generation of E-Way Bill restriction - An E-Way bill cannot be cancelled if it has been verified in transit in accordance with the provisions of rule 138B of the CGST Rules, 2017 .

SMS Facility - The facility of generation and cancellation of e-way bill will also be made available through SMS.

Key points

1. Value of consignment for E-Way bill

• An e-way bill has to be prepared for every consignment where the value of the consignment exceeds Rs.50,000/-
• Where multiple consignments of varying values (per consignment) are carried in a single vehicle, e-way bill needs to be mandatorily generated only for those consignments whose value exceeds Rs.50,000/-
• For multiple consignments being carried in the same vehicle, the transporter has to prepare a consolidated e-way bill by indicating serial number of each e-way bill, on the common portal prior to commencement of transport of goods

Note - This does not however preclude the consignor/ consignee/ transporter to generate e-way bills even for individual consignments whose value is less than Rs.50000/- per consignment

2. Change of vehicle by transporter

Any transporter transferring goods from one conveyance to another in the course of transit shall, before such transfer and further movement of goods, update the details of the conveyance in the e-way bill on the common portal in FORM GST EWB-01.

3. Documents required in transit

The person in charge of a conveyance has to carry following documents along with the E-Way Bill, during the transit of consignment:

(a) The invoice or bill of supply or delivery challan or Form GST INV 1, as the case may be; and (b) a copy of the e-way bill or the e-way bill number, either physically or mapped to a Radio Frequency Identification Device embedded on to the conveyance in such manner as may be notified by the Commissioner.

Exception to E-Way bill requirement

No e-way bill is required to be generated in the following cases:

a) Transport of goods as specified in Annexure to Rule 138 of the CGST Rules, 2017

b) goods being transported by a non-motorised conveyance;

c) goods being transported from the port, airport, air cargo complex and land customs station to an inland container depot or a container freight station for clearance by Customs;

d) in respect of movement of goods within such areas as are notified under rule 138(14) (d) of the SGST Rules, 2017 of the concerned State; and

e) Consignment value less than Rs. 50,000/-

Note : In case of Intra State/ UT transfer of goods within 10 Kms from the Consigner to Transporter and Transporter to Consignee, the details of conveyance in Part B of Form EWB – 1 may not be updated.

Enforcement and penalties for non-compliance

1. Penalties: 

As per Section 122 of the CGST Act, 2017, a taxable person who transports any taxable goods without the cover of specified documents (e-way bill is one of the specified documents) shall be liable to a penalty of Rs.10,000/- or tax sought to be evaded (wherever applicable) whichever is greater.

2. Detention and seizure: 

As per Section 129 of CGST Act, 2017, where any person transports any goods or stores any goods while they are in transit in contravention of the provisions of this Act or the rules made there under, all such goods and conveyance used as a means of transport for carrying the said goods and documents relating to such goods and conveyance shall be liable to detention or seizure.

3. Enforcement:

The Commissioner or an officer empowered by him in this behalf may

authorise the proper officer:

a) To Intercept any Conveyance to verify E-Way Bill

b) For Physical Verification of Vehicle – on receipt of specific information of

evasion of tax after necessary approval

Implementation Road Map

The GST Council in its 22nd meeting held 06th Oct, 2017 has decided to introduced the E-Way Bill system in a staggered manner with effect from 01- 01-2018 and shall be rolled out nationwide with effect from 01-04-2018.

At present the E-Way Bill procedure under GST has been successfully implemented for testing in the State of Karnataka. Based on the experience in Karnataka, necessary amendments in the procedures and system may be done. Further the GST Council has allowed the states to make their own Way Bill procedure till a unified procedure is being implemented across india and several states including UP, HP etc have prescribed their own Way Bill procedures in this regard.

It is expected that Rajasthan would be one of the pioneers in implementing the E-Way Bill system under GST with effect from 01-01-2018, although a notification for the same is yet to be issued.

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