Nepal Business Compliance Checklist

The deadline people miss by three months

The annual income tax return is due at the end of Ashoj — three months after the Ashadh year end. End of Poush is the extended date, and it is only available with IRD approval. Published guides quote one or the other as though it were simply “the deadline”, which is exactly how a business ends up three months late. Both are shown above, labelled.

Two VAT traps

Mixed supplies take the lower threshold. If you sell both goods and services, the Rs 30 lakh services figure applies — not the Rs 50 lakh goods one. Assuming otherwise leaves you trading unregistered while already liable.

Some sectors register from day one. Liquor, electronics, motor parts, software, restaurants with a bar, accounting, legal, consulting and audit register regardless of turnover. A turnover test alone would wrongly clear a Rs 2 lakh consultancy.

Order matters — but not the way it used to

If you are registering a firm (sole proprietorship or partnership), registration comes first, because the PAN application asks for the certificate. PAN then comes before VAT for the same reason. Out of order means a wasted trip.

If you are registering a company, this changed. The Office of the Company Registrar’s CAMIS system and the Inland Revenue Department now exchange data directly, so your PAN is created automatically when incorporation completes, and the certificate can be downloaded from CAMIS. You still have to complete biometric verification at an Inland Revenue Office before the number can be used, and PAN registration is still due within 30 days — but you are not applying from scratch. Guides written before the link went in still send company founders to queue for a number they already hold.

Two annual deadlines, two different offices

Companies file twice a year to two places, and the pair is easy to conflate. The annual return goes to OCR by the end of Poush. The income tax return goes to IRD by the end of Ashoj. Sole traders and partnerships file only the second. Missing the OCR one accrues penalties and eventually blocks routine company changes such as adding a director.

Sources

• Value Added Tax Act 2052 and IRD guidance — thresholds, the 30-day registration window and the compulsory sectors.
• Income Tax Act 2058 — the annual return within three months of the fiscal year end, extendable by three months with IRD approval, and the advance tax instalments.
• Contribution Based Social Security Act 2074 — SSF deposit within 15 days of month end.
• Office of the Company Registrar — the CAMIS portal and its notice on automatic PAN creation through the IRD interoperability link (checked 26 August 2026).
• Inland Revenue Department Taxpayer Portal and Social Security Fund employer portal — for the application routes, documents and verification steps named in each step above (checked 26 August 2026).

On fees. Published guides disagree about the OCR registration fee — some give fixed bands by authorised capital, others a flat percentage. Rather than pick one and present it as fact, the steps above point you at the figure CAMIS quotes for your own capital before you pay, which is the only authoritative one.

This is a checklist to orient you, not advice. It cannot know about sector licences, foreign investment approval, or municipal requirements that vary by ward. Nothing you enter leaves your device.