New Delhi: As The Faceless Assessment Scheme, 2019 kicks off, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has stipulated that all communications from the department to the taxpayer, assessee, third-party will be in the name of the National e-Assessment Center (NeAC) and no communication of any nature such as above will be made by any of the Regional e-Assessment Centres (ReACs) across 20 cities in the country.
The Income Tax Department has embarked on the journey of Faceless Tax Administration. The Faceless Assessment Scheme, 2019 has been announced by the Central Government. Further, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has notified the National e-Assessment Centre (NeAC) in Delhi and various Regional e-Assessment Centres (ReACs) across 20 cities in the country for implementation of the Scheme.
The CBDT has now given the detailed guidelines for the implementation of the Scheme and role of residual charges in this regard.
On the functions of the faceless hierarchy, the guidelines say that the NeAC/ReACs hierarchy will be tasked with management of Faceless Assessment proceedings and will be broadly responsible for functions.
All these functions will be through electronic means for which the NeAC will be the gateway and will function as such for all the flow of information. The officers and the staff in the ReACs will perform the functions relating to the assessment and verification function under the Income Tax Act, but all communications from the department to the taxpayer/assessee/third-party for the purposes of the Act will be in the name of the NeAC. No communication of any nature such as above will be made by any of the ReACs.
The functions of the NeAC, ReACs [Assessment Unit (AU), Verification Unit (VU), Review Unit (RU) and Technical Unit (TU)] have been delineated in detail separately by the NeAC in consultation with the Board.

