GST for Chartered Accountants and Company Secretaries: Registration, No Reverse Charge, and ITR Filing

Chartered Accountants and Company Secretaries are professionals whose own clients often ask them to explain GST — yet their own GST position is sometimes misunderstood by assuming it mirrors advocates, a genuinely different rule.

No Reverse Charge for CA/CS Services

Unlike legal services provided by advocates (which fall under reverse charge to business recipients under Notification 13/2017), professional services provided by Chartered Accountants and Company Secretaries are taxed under normal forward charge — the CA/CS firm itself charges GST on the invoice and remits it, exactly like most other professional services. There is no equivalent reverse-charge notification for CA/CS services. This is the single most important distinction from the legal-services rule, and one many people (including some legal and finance staff at client companies) get wrong by assuming CA/CS billing works the same way as advocate billing.

GST Registration Threshold

Standard ₹20 lakh threshold applies (₹10 lakh in special category states) — CA/CS professional services are taxed at 18%. A practising CA/CS with a growing client base typically registers well before hitting this ceiling anyway, since most corporate clients expect and require GST-compliant invoices from professional service providers as a standard commercial practice, independent of the legal threshold.

Multiple Revenue Streams — Different GST Treatment Each

A CA/CS practice often has several distinct income streams, and it's worth being precise about each:

• Audit and attestation fees — taxable at 18%, standard forward charge
• Tax representation and advisory — taxable at 18%
• Company secretarial compliance retainer (CS specifically) — taxable at 18%
• Teaching/training income (CA/CS faculty work) — generally taxable unless it falls under a specific education-sector exemption, which mostly doesn't apply to professional coaching for CA/CS exams
• Certification work under statutory schemes — check the specific notification, as a small number of government-mandated certifications carry exemptions

TDS on Professional Fees Received

Clients paying a CA/CS firm professional fees above ₹30,000 in a year deduct TDS at 10% under Section 194J — the same rule that applies to most other professionals covered in this series. Firms with a large number of retainer clients should reconcile Form 26AS/AIS against their fee register at least quarterly, since a large client base means more individual TDS certificates to track and match.

Income Tax Filing for CA/CS Professionals

Situation	Form & approach
Gross receipts up to ₹75 lakh, opting for presumptive taxation	ITR-4, Section 44ADA — 50% of receipts presumed as taxable income
Receipts above ₹75 lakh, or full-books filing	ITR-3, with tax audit required above the applicable threshold if not on presumptive basis
Practising through a partnership firm/LLP	ITR-5 for the firm; partners taxed individually on their profit share and remuneration

CA and CS are both notified professions under Section 44AA/44ADA, so the presumptive scheme is available on the usual terms — a solo practitioner in the early years of practice, with real expenses below 50% of receipts, often benefits from it; an established firm with significant staff, office, and technology costs may find full-books ITR-3 filing more accurate to their real margin.

Practical Notes for a Growing Practice

• Register for GST proactively rather than waiting for the threshold, given corporate clients' near-universal expectation of GST-compliant billing
• Track TDS certificates systematically as client count grows — this becomes a genuine reconciliation task, not a once-a-year afterthought, once you have dozens of retainer clients
• Re-evaluate presumptive vs. full-books filing each year as staff and infrastructure costs change the real expense ratio

If you're setting up an independent CA/CS practice and want the GST registration and invoicing set up correctly from day one, our GST registration service and ITR filing service support professional practices through both.