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Reconciliation Definitions and Glossary

Definitions, glossary entries, and reference explanations for terminology used across Indian reconciliation practice — TDS (Section 393 payment codes), GST (GSTR-2B, IMS, ITC), NACH (bounce codes, mandate types), bank statement analysis, credit signals, and platform settlements.

22 Articles in this cluster
India-specific Rates, sections, regulator language
Practitioner Written by finance operators
About this cluster

Indian reconciliation vocabulary is unlike any other jurisdiction's because it stacks parallel frameworks that all fire on the same transaction. A single distributor payment in a Hindustan Unilever or ITC ledger simultaneously invokes the Companies Act 2013 audit trail rule 3(1) proviso (immutable edit log required on the accounting system), the Income-tax Act 2025 (Section 393 payment codes replaced the legacy 194-series from 1 April 2025, with distributor commission now at code 1015 5% and contract manufacturing at 1023), the CGST Act 2017 (Section 15(2) valuation, Section 16(2)(aa) ITC gate against GSTR-2B, Rule 36B IMS acceptance), the RBI Master Directions on Payment Systems (governing the NACH channel through which the payment cleared), and Ind AS 21 or 109 or 115 as applicable (revenue recognition, expected credit loss, forex translation). NPCI standard bounce codes E001-E999, CBIC notifications 09-16/2025-CTR (the September 2025 GST 2.0 rate rationalisation), and MCA circulars each add their own vocabulary. Reconciliation software vendors serving Indian teams — Terra Insight's TransactIG, BlackLine, Cointab, HighRadius, Perfios, FinBox — all traffic in this shared terminology, but the definitions themselves are scattered across sixty-plus PDFs on the CBIC, MCA, RBI and NPCI websites. This hub consolidates them.

The entries in this cluster follow a strict structural convention: each definition names the governing statute and the specific section, sub-section or rule; states the operational context in one sentence (which reconciliation surface it applies to — bank recon, TDS recon, GSTR-2B recon, NACH mandate recon, platform settlement recon, or bank statement analysis for credit); gives the audit-defensible evidence a finance team must retain; and links to at least one operational deep-dive article. So the Bank Reconciliation Statement (BRS) entry cites Ind AS 21 forex translation plus the Companies Act 2013 audit trail rule, distinguishes monthly-close variance from year-end statutory BRS, and links to the HDFC/ICICI/SBI narration-pattern deep-dive. The Form 26AS entry references its successor Form 168 (introduced 1 April 2026 under the Income-tax Act 2025), the 26Q vs 27Q vs 27EQ deductor filings that populate it, and the deductee-side ledger reconciliation problem. The GSTR-2B entry references CGST Rule 60(7), the 14th-of-month generation cadence, the Invoice Management System (IMS) Rule 36B accept/reject/pending workflow that overlays it from FY25-26 onwards, and the ITC gate under Section 16(2)(aa).

A definition is a short reference; a full article is a deep operational treatment. This hub is the front-door for the definition-level content, and the operational cornerstones live in the adjacent clusters — TDS Sections (46 articles), GST Reconciliation (17), NACH/Statutory (11), Bank Reconciliation (10), Payment Gateway (13), Reconciliation Fundamentals (36) — each with its own hub. When an Indian CFO, controller, or CA firm partner needs to confirm the exact section a payment falls under, the bounce-code taxonomy for a failed mandate, or whether GSTR-3B or the newer IMS acceptance closes the ITC loop, they land here first. TransactIG operationalises every entry in this glossary as a rule-based classification against the ingested source-of-record file — no manual lookup, no VBA-macro tax matrix, no orphaned reference sheet.

Key topics covered
Bank Reconciliation Statement (BRS)
Ind AS 21 forex + Companies Act 2013 audit trail rule 3(1) proviso; monthly + year-end variants
Form 26AS + Form 168 (successor)
TDS credit reconciliation between deductor filing and deductee ledger
GSTR-2B + IMS regime
Auto-drafted ITC statement + Invoice Management System (Rule 36B) reconciliation cadence
NACH bounce codes E001-E999
NPCI standard failure taxonomy — insufficient funds vs mandate expired vs technical
Platform settlement UTR
Unique Transaction Reference for bank credit → aggregator settlement matching
Rule 32(5) valuation
Margin scheme for second-hand goods — old-gold trade-in, used vehicles
Section 43B(h) MSME
Micro/small supplier 45-day payment discipline + 3× RBI rate taxable interest
Section 194Q vs 194O
Buyer-side goods purchase TDS vs ECO e-commerce TDS — different sections + rates
All articles in this cluster (22)
Definition 6 min read

What is Cash Application (Cash App) in Receivables Reconciliation: Indian Finance Reference

Cash application — often shortened to 'cash app' inside Indian finance teams — is the accounts receivable process by which incoming customer payments captured in the bank statement are matched to the open invoices they were intended to settle. Done well, it closes the order-to-cash loop; done poorly, it creates unapplied cash and disputed dunning.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is a Debit Note vs Credit Note under GST Section 34: Indian Reference

A debit note increases the taxable value of an original supply; a credit note decreases it. Both are governed by Section 34 of the CGST Act, both must reference the original invoice, and both flow through GSTR-1 on the supplier side and GSTR-2B on the recipient side.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is Form 168 in Income Tax Act 2025: TDS Credit Statement Replacing Form 26AS for FY 2026-27 onwards

Form 168 is the annual tax credit statement issued under the Income Tax Act 2025. From the assessment year following FY 2026-27 it replaces Form 26AS as the official record of TDS, TCS, advance tax, and self-assessment tax credits available to a taxpayer. Each entry carries the new income-type payment code from the 1001-1092 series.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is ITC-04: Job Work Quarterly Form Explained for Indian Manufacturers

Form ITC-04 is the GST declaration under which a principal manufacturer reports inputs and capital goods sent to a job worker, goods received back, goods sent from one job worker to another, and goods supplied directly from the job worker's premises. It is the audit trail for Section 143 of the CGST Act.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is RMPV (Raw Material Price Variation): Auto-Component Index-Linked Pricing

RMPV is the formula-driven price adjustment clause that lives in almost every Indian auto-component supply contract. It links the per-piece sale price of a component to a published commodity index — steel, aluminium, copper, plastic resin — and triggers a periodic credit or debit note to settle the variation.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is Three-Way Matching in Indian Accounts Payable: PO–GRN–Invoice Reconciliation

Three-way matching is the discipline of cross-checking a purchase order, a goods receipt note, and a vendor invoice line by line before authorising payment. In the Indian AP context it is also the control that protects ITC eligibility under GST and ensures the correct TDS section is applied at deduction.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definition 6 min read

What is a Virtual Account in Bank Reconciliation: Indian Treasury Reference

A virtual account is a unique 16 to 20 digit account number issued by an Indian bank that maps to a single physical master account in the books. Every customer or counterparty is given its own virtual number to remit into, allowing the receiver to identify the payer with certainty even when the bank narration carries no invoice reference.

12 June 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

Financial Reconciliation Dictionary: Terms Used in Indian Finance Operations

A reference dictionary of 30 financial reconciliation terms for Indian finance operations — covering process concepts, transaction types, matching logic, and the reporting and control vocabulary that auditors and controllers use daily.

27 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

GST Reconciliation Glossary: Terms Every Finance Team Must Know

A working reference of GST reconciliation terms for Indian finance and tax teams — from GSTIN and ITC to IMS, GSTR-2B cut-off dates, and recipient mismatches — with practical context for each.

27 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

NACH and Payments Glossary: Key Terms for Reconciliation

A comprehensive glossary of NACH, ECS, mandate, and bulk payment terms for Indian NBFCs, lenders, and corporate treasury teams — including mandate types, return codes, reconciliation lag, and how NACH credits appear in bank statements.

27 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

Platform Settlement Glossary: Terms for E-Commerce and Payment Gateway Finance Teams

A reference glossary for platform settlement and payment gateway terms in India — covering MDR, TCS under Section 52, nodal accounts, chargeback, rolling reserve, and the tax treatment that makes settlement reconciliation in e-commerce uniquely complex.

27 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

TDS Glossary: Essential Terms for TDS Reconciliation in India

A plain-language reference of every TDS term your finance team encounters — from TAN and TRACES to correction returns and Section 206AB — with India-specific context for reconciliation.

27 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

What Is a Reconciliation Statement? Definition and Types for Indian Finance Teams

A reconciliation statement is a formal financial document that compares two independent records of the same transactions — such as a bank statement against a ledger, or Form 26AS against TDS receivable — and documents every identified difference with its classification and resolution status. In Indian enterprise finance, reconciliation statements are both an internal control requirement and, in several cases, a statutory obligation.

6 March 2026 Read →
How-To 4 min read

What Is Bank Reconciliation? Definition and Process for Indian Finance Teams

Bank reconciliation is the process of comparing a company's internal cash ledger with the corresponding bank statement entries, identifying and explaining every difference. For Indian finance teams, the process extends beyond standard timing differences to cover UTR-based transaction matching, UPI references, and NACH batch credits — each requiring a distinct matching approach.

6 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

What Is Automated Reconciliation? How It Differs from Manual Matching

Automated reconciliation is the use of software to ingest financial records from two or more data sources, apply configurable matching rules, identify matched and unmatched items, classify exceptions by variance type, and present a structured exception queue for human review. It replaces the manual process of opening two spreadsheets and performing VLOOKUP or visual comparison row by row — a method that becomes both unreliable and unsustainable above roughly 500 transactions per month.

6 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

What Is Form 26AS? The Tax Credit Statement Explained for Indian Businesses

Form 26AS is the consolidated annual tax credit statement issued by the Income Tax Department of India, linked to a taxpayer's PAN. It consolidates TDS deducted by all deductors, TCS collected by sellers, advance tax paid, and refunds received — and serves as the primary document for reconciling TDS receivable in the company's books against credits actually deposited with the government.

6 March 2026 Read →
How-To 4 min read

What Is GSTR-2B? The Auto-Populated ITC Statement Explained

GSTR-2B is a static, auto-populated statement of available Input Tax Credit (ITC) generated for every GST-registered taxpayer from the 13th or 14th of the following month. Unlike GSTR-2A, which updates continuously as suppliers file, GSTR-2B is a fixed snapshot for the return period — and since January 2022, ITC claims are restricted to what appears in GSTR-2B under Rule 36(4), with no provisional buffer permitted.

6 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

What Is ITC in GST? Input Tax Credit Explained for Indian Businesses

Input Tax Credit (ITC) is the mechanism under India's GST framework that allows a registered business to offset the tax paid on purchases and inward supplies against the GST collected on its sales. The net difference — output tax minus eligible ITC — is the actual liability payable to the government. Since January 2022, ITC claims are restricted to amounts appearing in GSTR-2B, making supplier-level reconciliation a statutory requirement rather than an optional audit step.

6 March 2026 Read →
How-To 4 min read

What Is NACH in Banking? National Automated Clearing House Explained

NACH — National Automated Clearing House — is the centralised clearing infrastructure operated by NPCI that replaced the legacy Electronic Clearing Service system across Indian banking. It standardises recurring payment collection and disbursement through a single clearing hub with uniform file formats, UMRN-based mandate tracking, and T+1 return cycles.

6 March 2026 Read →
How-To 4 min read

What Is a Payment Gateway Settlement? How Online Payments Reach Your Bank Account

A payment gateway settlement is the process by which a payment aggregator collects customer payments, deducts its charges — MDR, GST on MDR, platform fees, TCS for marketplace operators — and transfers the net amount to the merchant's designated bank account. Settlement typically occurs on a T+1 to T+7 cycle depending on the gateway and merchant tier, and the settlement file provided by the gateway is the primary document for order-level reconciliation.

6 March 2026 Read →
How-To 4 min read

What Is TDS Deduction? How Tax Deducted at Source Works in India

TDS — Tax Deducted at Source — is a withholding mechanism under the Income Tax Act, 1961, where the entity making a payment deducts a prescribed percentage of tax before crediting the payee. The deducted amount is deposited with the government under the deductee's PAN, and the deductee claims it as a credit when filing the income tax return. PAN errors and deposit timing gaps are the two primary causes of TDS reconciliation mismatches.

6 March 2026 Read →
Definitions 4 min read

What Is a UTR Number? Unique Transaction Reference in Indian Banking

A UTR — Unique Transaction Reference — is the payment-system-level identifier assigned to every interbank fund transfer in India. It is generated by the clearing infrastructure (NEFT, RTGS, IMPS, or UPI), not by the sending bank or application, making it the only reference that both the sender's and receiver's banks can independently verify for a given transaction.

6 March 2026 Read →

See how TransactIG handles every definition in one platform

TransactIG ingests bank statements, TDS certificates, GSTR-2B, NACH mandate files, and platform settlements in their native formats, applies rule-based classification per statute + section + code, and produces audit-ready reconciliation packs with a full glossary-anchored variance register.