Power Of GST

I am not sure how many of you have experienced the real power of GST.

I was forced to get a GST registration as part of am empanelment requirement for a MNC firm where I plan to provide executive coaching services even though I don't think in this Janam I will reach the Rs 20 Lakhs per year threshold for a GST registration number from my coaching and consulting services.
However the MNC rules are what it is and you have to comply period. No arguments!!

I managed to get my GST registration with the help of a consultant. Initially I thought I will go the DIY way -  study the  manual, read FAQs, Watch youtube videos. After all the effort I found I was making no headway and took the consultant route. The consultant obviously did this for a fee even though I have no "Dhandha" or revenue  to show till date. I have had multiple meetings in the last 6 months  with my client but so far I have  not scored the most important  single and opened my account. I felt like Rahul Dravid with his famous solid defence in the 2001-2 test against England in Bangalore. At least  he took  only 61 balls to score 3 runs while  I am still trying to get my first single.

Now comes the fun part. I kept getting SMSes  from  GSTIND asking me which option I am choosing for filing my return. Since I did not have any income to show I decided to ignore. They persisted and finally I gave in and opted for monthly return - GSTR3B. 

I decided to do nothing much now that SMSes stopped. Anyway I was still playing defensively forward- No  Single, No Dhandha, No revenue  still!!

A new set of SMSes started checking with me whether I have filed the return or not.I was under the impression no income- no return like IT returns. However the SMSes persisted and I  decided to check with my consultant.  

What she told me was an eye opener. She said even though you have no income you have to file a return declaring  nil income - Not sure whether the finance minister is adding all this to show an inflated number of tax payers as part of the "Acche Din " program.
So having left with no other option but to start filing my return I asked what would be her service charges. She said it would cost me Rs 2000 per month. I decided to once again go the  DIY way. Once again skimmed through  the manuals and watched multiple youtube videos some in Hindi, some in Hinglish from CA's from Delhi to Darbanga.
I tried filing using the knowledge I had gained in the DIY method. 

Here comes the power of GST- Even though you have no revenue and you declare that you have no revenue if you delay filing you return claiming you have nil revenue you still end up paying a late fee of Rs 20 per day (Rs 10 for state and Rs 10 for centre) with a cap of Rs 5000. All this for zero revenue. 
In my DIY experiment I had overshot the November deadline by 30 days which means a late fee of Rs 600 which I paid. Now I tried filing my return but wouldn't allow me inspite of various options suggested onYoutube.

Like a true IT support professional I raised a ticket  with the GST help desk with a screen shot  and other details  of my problem.  I got a quick response within 24 hours  and advised me to read the manual properly as the solution and the ticket was promptly closed. 
Reluctantly I  once again went back to my consultant and she after checking with a  SME she told me that I have paid under the wrong category. I should have paid under Fees rather than penalty. She also told me to file for a refund and pay the late fee in the right category. ( My experience of how difficult or easy it is going to be will be my next story). 

In all this the late fee meter had moved and I ended up paying Rs 860 ( a delay of 43 days) all for zero revenue. Finally I filed my return November - Late fee - Rs 860 - Income Zero, December - Late Fee Rs 200 - Income Zero again. 


I am wondering if this the trouble an  IT aware , computer literate person had to go through what would the experience of an " Aam Admi business man " who was happily doing his Dhandha  on cash basis now that he/she is forced on the GST wagon.
  

My coaching journey

I started my coaching journey based on a feedback from the president of my organization.
In an open house meeting he said that he can tell the "personal brand" of anybody and that was a special trait he had developed.

I got up and asked him to tell me my brand. He said  he does not want to talk about it in an open meeting and  we will discuss it in our next monthly 1:1 meeting.

In my next monthly meeting he said that my brand is that of  "genuine helper" and a coach. I was sort taken aback - helper does not sound very fashionable from a corporate standard . I have always related helpers to the "chotus" in a chai shop or in a garage-. Have always heard things like - "Chotu spanner dhena/ panch number table me pani marna"

However this sort of kindled my curiosity on the coach part.I started reading about coaching and thanks to a friend of mine ( he was making  a sales pitch to the extended leadership team on selling his services) I got into making a serious commitment on coaching. I enrolled myself for a certification program from CFI ( coaching foundation of India) which was spread over a six month period.
This was based on a model by Gerad Eagan who calls a coach as a skilled helper. So my boss wasn't wrong in calling me as a helper.
The coaching program included practicing the skills on two coachees with a whole lot of documentation to prove that I have indeed used the skills learnt in the class.

Got my certification and I am now Certified CEO coach.

Having decided to take a break in my career now to pursue coaching I find having a certificate alone does not guarantee any "Dhanda".  Coaching seems to be a hard sell. I tried with my head of L&OD to give me some coaching assignments ( was willing to do it free) so that my knowledge doesn't get rusted. However his point is that he cannot immediately show any ROI as coaching is all about behaviour changes which takes some time. ( you don't become assertive overnight just because you have attended a assertiveness course for 2 days!!).

Spoke to a couple experienced coaches  who have slogged it over the last 6-7 years.
This is a long process - Have to build my brand, network, specific offering , write blogs with followers. In the social media space there are so many groups especially in linked in with so many members. Not sure how many have made coaching as the only offering.
Anyway early days. I will share my experience over time...

Social Networks - Now and Then

Yesterday Sindhu my elder daughter took the flight to US to join the masters course at CMU Pittsburgh.

All of us including some of her close friends were there at the airport to see her off.

This is a 16 month course which she was keen to get into. With a decent score in GMAT and a good recommendation from her boss and professor she got her admission.Over the course of time other events like getting her student visa, booking tickets etc.. .was happening in quick time.

Thanks to social networking tools like Face book etc.. she knew who her batch mates were from Bangalore as well as other parts of India.She could choose her room mates in her future apartment and knew a lot about their family and academic backgrounds and how they looked like etc. etc.. even before she booked her tickets.

She had all the other information on her apartment how it looks like, which bus to take to the college, how much time it took by walk etc..

The flight time was an unearthly 1.50AM .( I don't know why all international airlines fly out India only in the grave yard shift!!)

The airport was filled with enthusiastic students going to various universities across the USA with stars in their eyes and hope in their heart even though the big news of US likely to get into a double dip recession was all over the media and the US stock markets had tanked over 4% on that day.

For us this was a new transition. The first time in 24 years Sindhu is going to be away from home. Though we knew she was back home after 5 months in December still it was a heavy feeling. The presence of Sindhu's friends helped in keeping the emotional "dam" in check .

Finally when she went in to board the flight we told her to inform us on her arrival at Paris and inform us once again again prior to taking off to Pittsburgh.

Like the millennial tech savvy kids of today she used the free wi-fi service which was available for 15 minutes at Paris to keep us posted about her safe arrival and effectively avoided using expensive global roaming option on her mobile.

In spite of all this we had our moments of tension when she took more than an hour post her arrival to send us an update.

Let me fast rewind in time. - I left for Pilani way back in 1974 with hopes and stars in my eyes for my engineering degree. None of us at home had an idea how I should be preparing for this adventure. Starting from language - None of us knew hindi ( Hindi movies were just getting popular in Chennai and a couple of theaters dared to show Hindi Movies!!). Nobody had gone North of Chenai. Anything beyond tirupathi was north India for us. Somebody said it will be very cold and I should take warm clothes. I had one old sweater which had some holes but thanks to Amma's patch work you could not make out till you were real close.

I found a batch mate who was joining the course with me purely by accident. This was using a social network of a different kind!!. My batch mate's father and my father were at the same bank getting a demand draft for the fees at BITS. They exchanged notes after which I was introduced to my first BITS friend Sudharma.

We became close and were called the "Laurel and Hardy" of our batch. I was well built like "Hardy" and Sudharma was relatively short like "Laurel" . He was all brains in his 5ft 1in frame.
We took the GT express from Chennai central and my father and mother bid us good bye and told me to send a post card as soon as I reach.( we never had a phone. there was only one phone in our lane and it was a big thing to own a phone those days.) I sent home a post card which I guess must have reached them may be a couple of weeks or may be a month down the line.

My first trip abroad was to Germany in 1982. I asked my then Regional Manager MP Kala on how I should prepare for the trip. His only advice was that I should take cigarettes from India as they are very expensive in Germany and you have to buy in packs unlike in India where you could get singles from the road side paan wala. Besides this he said you have to figure on your own and he said that I am being paid enough money to cover the eight weeks. ( I was given USD 500 in which i was expected to pay the hotel rent for 5 weeks.Incidentally the exchange rate for the $ was Rs eight per $.)
I reached Germany Via Paris and this was a eight week trip covering Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland. As soon as I reached I posted a card home at the Frankfurt station informing my parents about my safe arrival. Post my trip I came home to Chennai . I received this card after a couple of days after arriving at Chennai!!

While me and my wife were terribly worried when the update from Sindhu got delayed by an hour not sure what would have been going through my parent's minds when for months together they would not hear from me. I don't know how they kept their cool. Unfortunately both of them are not around now for me to ask this question and get their secret.....

Three Short of century

Recently I went to the doctor for a health check up. The doctor like more than 50% of us in India seems to be an avid Bhakt of our national religion - Cricket.
He had one of the cricket channels running on the small monitor inside his consultation room.
There was a re run of one of the old one day matches may be as part of the program " India victorious" or something. It had Viru bhai one of my favorites thrashing Pakistan all over the place at Karachi in front of their home crowd.
Incidentally I remember Viru hit a century in this match and got us the win. If you also see the statistics whenever Viru has done well India has gone to win the match.
It was my turn . The doctor did the usual checks - Blood pressure, weight, height etc..
He suddenly said " Three short of century". I thought he was talking about Viru's innings which was on the TV. I said no doc he scored a century in this match. The doctor replied "I am not talking of Viru, I am talking about you- Your weight is Three kgs short of a century and you better do some thing about it". He also went on to say that I am on the wrong side of fifty and though I have no issues ( Sugar cholestrol etc.. ) as of now they could come any time into my life if I indeed reach the century like Viru.

Pushpa my better half was also around when all this conversation was taking place. She immediately wanted to me to get into serious action. I was trying to tell her that nothing much has changed in my life style - I still slog like the earlier days almost doing sixty hours per week at office. This in spite of people giving feedback on my 360degree appraisal that I need to manage my work life balance.(Honestly I never understood the cliche - Work Life balance - How can you balance across two different areas. However this is one big topic which seems to be part of the employers attractiveness as per many of the surveys on why people join and stay with an organization!!).

Now coming back to my "TSOC" (Three Short Of Century) stage Pushpa wanted some immediate action. I was trying to tell her it is in my genes and can't do too much about it now. I reminded her that her mother-in-law was healthy which must have passed on to me. She did not relent but got me enrolled in a yoga class with a personal trainer.
Murthy was my neighbor's yoga trainer who used to come home and teach. Very interesting character. He is 63 and is up every day at 4.30 and his first class starts at 5.30. He says he has 5-6 classes everyday of an hour each and he does all the exercises along with the students. So some stamina for his age. He always prides himself as an innovator and tries modifications of existing Asanas like Trikonasana ( All others teach only one variant- We are the people who teach you four variations. Even Shilpa Shetty's video does not go beyond two variations!! Says Murthy proudly).
Thanks to him and some discipline from within I am now able at least do some of the asanas and pranayama regularly. Now I can do Kapalbhati for 350 counts and the target is to reach 500 counts.
According to Baba Ramdev Kapal Bhati is a great way to keep your weight in check besides fighting the battle of the bulge. Now that I have been a regular for the last 2 months wanted to check with my wife and kids whether they see any visible change in my mid section. My daughter claims she can see change of few microns off my belly - Guess she must be having fantastic eyesight.

Anyway the Pranayama has helped to feel energetic through out the day while I fight my battle of the Bulge and making sure I don't reach the coveted century mark.

Hopefully time will tell whether this happens and hope my motivation also holds up in my battle ...

Electricity Bill

Usually I try to pay my electricity bill through the bill pay option from my bank account.It is so convenient. However I missed it this month. Madam who usually gets hyper for smaller things ( thanks to My pop in law's genes) gave me an ultimatum to pay it immediately and she could visualize the line getting disconnected by evening. Basically she gave me no choice.
I had no clue where to pay and finally my driver said that BESCOM has many franchisees where you could pay. So I went to Reddy's pharmacy on our road Only Cash the lady at the counter said firmly.I came back with a receipt which looked like a idli vada bill from Srinidhi sagar with a big smile. Madam was very apprehensive and was sure that the line getting disconnected. She said I should have gone to the BDA center and paid through cheque etc.. Fortunately so far our line has been intact and Reddy's franchise also seems to be.

This takes me back to my childhood days where paying electricity bill was an elaborate affair at home. My grandfather had an efficient system of keeping track of the electricity bills. All the bills and the receipts used to be filed on a metal hook which used to hang from the door knob in our hall. As soon as a new bill came in my grandfather will check for it's accuracy and in case of small rounding off error he used to talk on how things were absolutely prim and propah during the "angrez ka Zamana" and how it has changed post independence. Thank god he is not alive today. "Gaplas" and "Gotalas" of Rs 10 crore don't make front page news any more as the levels of corruption seem to have their own standards if they have to be front page news.

Coming back to the electricity bill payment my grand father's excitement levels used to go up in exponential proportion as the due date for the electricity bill approached. He would have talked to everybody including our milk man,maid servant, vegetable seller, fruits vendor and his friends on how he has an important assignment in the coming days - paying our electricity bill.
On the "D" day we used to leave home by 5.45 AM ( we have to be beat the queue was his solid argument) with the exact amount for the bill. ( My grandfather would have checked this at least a dozen times in the past one week).
Most of the times we weren't the first one in the queue. Another grandfather like mine would have beat us to the queue for the "mission possible".
Finally around 7.30PM we would have completed our "mission possible" with a beaming smile on my grandfather's face of having completed a big task. Post our "mission" we had hot idly and coffee at the udupi hotel which was only reason I used to accompany my grandfather.
How I wish we could go back to a time where life was not complicated and even simple tasks were taken with a lot of seriousness and responsibility and completing them was considered such a big achievement.

Aduthathu Ambujathai parthela!!

Recently I went for a an annual executive health checkup. Supposed to be an annual one but I guess I did this after almost 18 months.
While most of the critical reading were ok some especially the ones around triglycedrides count was on the higher side.
One of pushpa's close friends husband also went through this routine some time back . After the tests the wife has absolute control over what he eats at home ( What he eats outside is anybody's guess). Pushpa and her friend have a daily review , which generally lasts for a couple of hours when they are busy and about four hours plus when they have time. They keep sharing notes especially on the hot topic of the season- diet control. Pushpa's friend is putting her husband through a diet consisting No sugar, No oil, no rice, no Alu virtually "No Nothing" with "Ghas Phus" in its native form for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Besides this new therapies like " Louki Juice" in the morning which is supposed to a super cure for triglycerides gets tried. Now I am a guinea pig for this medicine at home now. No more bed coffee- First glass of fresh "louki Juice" and then anything else is my routine now.
"Aduthathu Ambujathai parthela" is a famous song from K.Balachandar's classic of 1968 "Edhir Neechal". What this song talks about is comparison (fair as well as unfair) with your friendly neighbors and how to be one up on your neighbor and friends.
In this song "Pattu Mami" compares her husband "Kittu Mama" to their friendly neighbor ""Aduthathu Ambujam's" husband. She says how their neighbor gives in to anything "Aduthathu Ambujam" asks for and how "kadoos" and "Kanjoos" Kittu is.
Thanks to the "Aduthathu Ambujam effect Pushpa keeps suggesting and trying out new "Patti" remedies on poor me. ( Having Methi Husk is next in line for me - Yuck).
I guess the concept of "Aduthathu Ambujam" has taken a new avatar especially in the IT industry and is renamed as the market benchmark exercise which has helped consultants to come out with fancy reports and charts on where you stand against all the "Ambujams" in the industry.
This has opened up a decent revenue stream for consulting firms since now "looking good" in front of "Ambujams" of the industry is the new survival mantra especially for senior management.

Can your kids be your counsellor!!

I am not sure how many have this experience.
Ever since Sindhu joined her new company ( from Campus) she travels with me in the morning to office and most of the times I drive her back to home from work.
Sindhu is my daughter who has just completed her engineering and has joined a captive center of a US MNC as a trainee.
Her office is two blocks away from my office in the same tech park at Bangalore.
So she gives me a dump of what has happened in her day everyday while we drive back.She talks about her frustrations where she continues to be on training even after 3 months of joining the company. She is eager to get some real hands on experience on what project work in the IT world looks like. However she has to wait for some time I guess. Her friends who joined with her from her campus have started getting into real work on some projects hence the discomfort level is keeps increasing.

I tell her to develop patience and use this time effectively to enhance her skills by way self study and trying to get some industry certifications.

She says even her boss has been saying the same thing.
That said on our drive back I talk about my challenges and frustrations at my office. Sindhu patiently listens to me and gives me some fresh ideas and suggestions.
This also gives me a perspective of how the "Internet era kids" look at life and challenges we face day in an day out in corporate life. Besides giving some fresh ideas this takes the load of the tension we undergo in Bangalore's famous traffic.

My take on this incident is ( as my good friend Shankar always says!!) that if you treat today's smart kids as adults rather than kids and build the level of trust you could possibly use them as your counselor to listen to our daily woes as well get some "Hatke" ideas