PAC · REPORTS · STATUTORY REPORTS · INDIA
Generating the quarterly Form 138 TDS challan report
A start-to-finish walkthrough: setting up the legal entity, uploading Challan Data, entering challans, splitting employees across several challans, and producing the TXT file for FVU or the Excel file for review.
Report: India Challan 138 TDS (formerly Form 24Q)
Contents
- The whole flow.. 2
- Before you start 2
- Upload Challan Data (optional) 3
- Start the report 4
- Normal challans. 5
- Multiple challans in a month. 6
- Generate the TXT or Excel file. 7
- Check and file. 7
- Amend or reuse an existing challan. 8
- Known issues and limits. 8
- Reference. 8
1. The whole flow
A quarterly return covers three payroll months. You enter every TDS challan paid for those months in one report, then generate the file. Steps marked “if needed” are only needed in some situations.
| Step | What | Details |
| 1 | Prepare | Payroll closed, challans paid, entity fields set |
| 2 · if needed | Upload Challan Data | To override amount / tax. Independent of the report. |
| 3 | Start report | Reports → Statutory Reports → + |
| 4 | Enter challans | One card per challan, all 3 months |
| 5 · if needed | Map employees | When a month has several challans |
| 6 | Generate | TXT for filing, Excel for review |
| 7 | Check & file | Reconcile, run FVU, upload |
2. Before you start
The report reads most of its content from payroll and from the legal entity’s setup. Gaps here show up as blank or wrong fields in the file.
Payroll and challans
- Payroll is closed for each month of the quarter (e.g. Apr, May, Jun for Q1). The report period list only offers closed periods. If an entity has only one closed period, it is filled in automatically.
- TDS has been paid and you have the challan receipts from the income tax portal. For every challan, note the Challan Serial No, BSR Code, payment date and the split of Income Tax, Surcharge, Cess, Interest, Other Amount and Late Pay Fee.
- Every employee has a PAN on their record ($hr.pan). The deductee rows use the employee’s PAN, not the company’s.
Legal entity HR fields
These fill the file header and batch header. You can set them at country level or entity level. If both exist, the entity-level value is used.
| Group | Fields |
| Deductor | tan, pan, token_number, deductor_type_code, 24q_deductor_state_code, email, mobile |
| Address | Legal entity address 2: address_line_1, postal_code, city |
| Responsible person | auth_person, auth_person_designation, auth_person_email, authorised_person_pan, authorised_person_state, authorised_person_country (full name, e.g. India) |
| FIXED FIELDS
Contact country codes are always 91, Form Number is 138, the section code is 1002 (non-government employee), and payment, deduction and deposit dates use the last day of the payroll month. You don’t need to enter these. |
3. Upload Challan Data (optional)
Challan Data is separate from report creation. It is stored per legal entity and serial number, so upload it before you start the report (or any time before you generate). Use it when the figures actually paid differ from what payroll calculated, for example after a correction outside payroll, a take-on from another provider, or a full & final settlement adjustment or for multiple challan of an employee in one month. You upload the correct figures per employee and per challan, and the report uses them instead of the system’s.
Prepare the file
Use an .xlsx or .xls file with these columns. Each row is one employee on one challan.
| Challan Serial Number | Employee ID | Employee Name | Amount Credit | Total Tax Deducted |
| 03771 | EMP-1001 | Example Employee A | 85000 | 6200 |
| 03771 | EMP-1002 | Example Employee B | 92000 | 7150 |
| 09001 | EMP-1003 | Example Employee C | 78000 | 0 |
Upload, review and edit
- On the Reports page, open Challan Data (top right, next to the existing reports).
- Click +, choose your file and click Import.
- Check the rows on the review screen. They are grouped by Challan Serial Number. Click Save.
- To change a figure later, click the row, edit it in the Edit Challan Data window and save.
- Use the ⋮ menu on a row to Download its rows to Excel or Delete them.
The data stays saved for the legal entity across logins until you change or delete it.
How the override behaves
| Situation | Result in the report |
| Challan Data exists for the challan’s serial number | For each listed employee, Amount Paid/Credited and Total Tax Deducted come from Challan Data, in both TXT and Excel. |
| Serial number on the card differs from the upload (e.g. 3771 vs 03771) | No override. Matching is exact; only leading and trailing spaces are ignored. |
| Employee is on the challan but not in Challan Data | Keeps the system-calculated figures. |
| Final Amount Paid/Credited is 0 or negative | The employee is left off that challan, because the income tax portal rejects such rows. |
| Row edited, or same serial uploaded again | The latest saved figures are used. A new upload replaces only the serial numbers it contains. |
| Challan Data deleted | Back to system-calculated figures. |
Rows are matched on Employee ID; the name in the file is not used. On upload, rows are rejected if they have an unknown employee, a negative amount or a missing required value. Other valid rows in the file still save. A file with missing columns is rejected entirely.
| USING BOTH FEATURES
Employee selection decides who is on each challan. Challan Data decides what amounts they show. You can use both on the same challan. |
| KEEP CHALLAN TOTALS IN LINE
Uploading Challan Data changes the employee rows only. The challan line still uses the amounts on the challan card. After overriding, check that each challan’s Total Tax Deducted equals the sum of its employees’ tax, and update the card if needed. |
4. Start the report
- In PAC, open the legal entity and go to Reports → Statutory Reports.
- Click the + icon. The New statutory report window opens.
- Fill in the fields below, then click Continue.
| Field | What to choose |
| Statutory report name | Pre-filled as India Challan 138 TDS. |
| New / Existing challan | New challan the first time you prepare this quarter. Existing challan to reopen challans you saved earlier (see section 9). |
| Existing challan | Only shown for Existing challan. Pick the saved challan set. |
| Report period | The payroll period(s) the report covers. |
| Employees | Tick Active, Inactive or both. Include Inactive if anyone left during the quarter and had TDS deducted. |
| Format | Txt for the file you validate and file. Excel for a readable copy to review. You get one format per report (see section 7). |
5. Normal challans
This is the usual case: one challan per month, so three challan cards for the quarter. Step 2 (Challan Details) shows a card for each challan.
Fill each challan card
| Field | Required | Notes |
| Payroll Period | Yes | The month this challan pays tax for, e.g. Apr 01 → 30. |
| Challan Serial No | Yes | Up to 5 digits, from the challan receipt. Pick from the list or type it. Type it exactly as it appears on the receipt and in your Challan Data upload (section 3), or the override won’t apply (03771 and 3771 are different). |
| BSR Code | For bank challans | 7 digits. When filled (and no Transfer Voucher Code), the payment mode becomes C (challan). |
| Cheque / DO No | No | Up to 15 digits. |
| Payment Date of Challan | Yes | The date on the receipt. |
| Income Tax | Yes | Income tax only, without surcharge, cess, interest or other amounts. |
| Surcharge, Cess | No | N/A in Form 138 |
| Interest, Other Amount, Late Pay Fee | No | Leave blank when there is none. |
| Minor Head Code | Yes | Defaults to 200 – TDS (TDS payable by taxpayer). Change it only for a 400 (regular assessment) or 100 (advance tax) challan. |
| Transfer Voucher Code | For book adjustment | Up to 8 characters. When filled, the payment mode becomes B (book adjustment). |
Add a card for each further challan in the quarter, and set each card’s Payroll Period to the right month.
Save and generate
- Click Save Challan to store the challan details. You can come back to them later with Existing challan.
- Click Save & generate report. If the button stays disabled, save the challan first and check that every required field is filled.
6. Multiple challans in a month
Some clients pay one month’s TDS through two or more challans, for example one per pay group or location. Add one card per challan and give each the same Payroll Period. Then decide how employees are split across them.
| Option | How it works | Use it when |
| A. Let the system allocate | Don’t select employees. The system fills the month’s challans in order: employees’ tax goes into the first challan until its tax amount is used up, then the remainder goes into the next challan. If an employee’s tax crosses that limit, their tax is split between the two challans. | It doesn’t matter which employees go on which challan. |
| B. Choose the employees per challan | Pick exactly which employees each challan covers. When the report is generated, each challan contains only its selected employees. | Each challan was paid for a specific group of employees. |
Option B: select employees on screen
- On the challan card, click Select employees manually. A full-screen selector opens with Available on the left and Selected on the right.
- Click + next to an employee, or tick several and move them together. The checkbox at the top of a list selects everyone shown.
- Use the filter icon to show only Active, Inactive or Draft employees. The count updates as you filter.
- To remove someone, click X next to their name on the right.
- Click Continue. The card now shows how many employees are selected. Cancel leaves without changes.
- Repeat for each challan, then click Save Challan. The selection is stored with the challan and comes back when you reopen it.
Option B: upload the employee list
For a large group, click Upload Excel at the top of the selector. Use an .xlsx or .xls file with exactly these column headers:
| Employee ID | Employee Name |
| EMP-1001 | Example Employee A |
| EMP-1002 | Example Employee B |
Employees are matched on Employee ID, and matches move to Selected. A message gives the number added, and a second message lists rows that didn’t match (e.g. “Row 5: Invalid ID”). Fix those rows and upload again.
| RULES TO REMEMBER
A challan with no selected employees includes all eligible employees, as before. Selecting employees on one challan doesn’t affect the others. The Deductee sheet lists each employee once, even when they appear on several challans. |
| CHECK THE TOTALS
The challan’s amounts come from what you typed on the card. Make sure each card’s tax amount equals the total tax of the employees you selected for it. Otherwise the challan line and the employee rows won’t reconcile. |
7. Generate the TXT or Excel file
- Click Save & generate report. The report appears in the Statutory Reports list with its status and a Report type column (Txt or Excel).
- When it has finished, download it from the list. The file comes in the format you chose when creating the report.
- Need both formats? Create a second report: click +, choose Existing challan, pick the same challan, choose the other format and generate. Both files then use the same challan data.
File name
Built from the legal entity’s legal name, plus 138:
- Two or more words: first 2 letters of word 1 + first 2 letters of word 2. For example, Acme Payroll Services Pvt Ltd → txt
- One word: first 4 letters. For example, Acme → xlsx
What’s in each file
| TXT (for FVU and filing) | Excel (for review) |
| File header | Q1–Q3: Deductee, Challan, Deduction sheets |
| Batch header (BH): deductor, address and responsible person | Q4: the three above, plus Salary Details, Sec 16 and Chapter VI-A |
| Challan detail (CD): one line per challan | Same figures as the TXT for the same run. Use it to check figures, not to file. |
| Deductee detail (DD): one line per employee per challan |
8. Check and file
- Reconcile in Excel. Compare each employee’s Amount Paid/Credited and Total Tax Deducted with the tax register for the quarter (see section 11 for how they’re calculated).
- Check each challan. The total tax of its employees should equal its Total Tax Deducted, and the serial number, BSR code and date should match the receipt.
- Spot-check the edge cases: employees who left, full & final settlements, employees on several challans, and anyone whose figures you overrode.
- Validate the TXT with the File Validation Utility (FVU). Fix any errors at the source (challan card, entity fields, payroll or Challan Data), then regenerate. Don’t edit the TXT by hand.
- File the validated output on the income tax portal as usual.
9. Amend or reuse an existing challan
- Reports → Statutory Reports → +, then choose Existing challan.
- Pick the challan, set the Report period, Employees and Format, and click Continue.
- The saved cards open, including any employee selections. Edit, add or delete cards as needed.
- Save Challan, then Save & generate report.