Filing ITR 5, ITR-6, ITR-7: ICAI flags issues amid demand for tax audit due date extension

While the ITR filing due date for non-audit cases ended on September 16, taxpayers whose accounts need to be audited must submit their returns by October 31, 2025.

Taxpayers in audit cases typically file their returns using ITR-5, ITR-6 and ITR-7. However, they are facing issues on the e-filing portal for multiple reasons, according to the Direct Tax Committee (DTC) of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI).

The following are the issues shared by ICAI's DTC with CBDT around issues in filing ITR-5, 6 and 7:

1)Excel utilities for ITR 5, 6 and 7 were enabled in August, 2025. Offline utility for ITR 5 was enabled on September 6 and ITR 7 was enabled on September 18. Income Tax Return Form of ITR-5 and ITR-7 are enabled to file through Online mode with prefilled data at the portal only on September 19, 2025. Offline and Online utility for ITR 6 is yet to be enabled as on date.

2)Members have expressed concern that excel utility of department portal if opened in old version of excel shows error messages.

3)Excel utility was updated again on September 16, 2025, due to which JSON generated through proprietary software has to be again opened in department utility and revalidated and uploaded, ultimately consuming a lot of time.

4)Another concern is that Excel Utility of ITR 5 is not working properly and is showing error of 32 bit vs 64 bit compatibility. Since the online utility was not available up to September 19, taxpayers were trying the Offline ITR Utility which was too slow.

5)As far as ITR 6 is concerned, the excel utility is not found to be convenient by many taxpayers. The data loading in the Excel utility is very slow and while the utility is working, other Excel files do not work. Also, it is not possible to upload the voluminous data in TDS schedule as per Form 26AS as there is no option to pull the data directly from 26AS.

6)There are cases where, despite using the latest version of the utility and ensuring proper validation of the JSON file, the portal does not allow successful submission. The system either shows an error message or fails to complete the upload process. This issue is causing unnecessary delay in filing and compliance.

8)There are also cases where, though there is no error in JSON, after inserting the DSC, message stating "ERROR DESCRIPTION AS NULL" appears.