TDS Certificate — Form 16, Form 16A and Form 16B Download Guide FY 2025-26

The three TDS certificate forms serve different purposes and are issued in different situations. Understanding which form applies to your situation prevents errors in ITR filing and ensures TDS credit is claimed correctly. All three are PDF documents that carry a unique TRACES certificate number and are digitally signed by the issuer.nnForm 16 is the TDS certificate for salary income under Section 192. It is issued by the employer to every employee from whose salary TDS was deducted during the financial year. Form 16 has two mandatory parts — Part A downloaded from TRACES by the employer, and Part B prepared by the employer. Together they constitute the complete salary TDS certificate. Form 16 is used by salaried employees to file ITR-1 or ITR-2.nnForm 16A is the TDS certificate for all non-salary TDS deductions from resident payees. It covers TDS deducted under Section 194C (contractor payments), Section 194J (professional fees), Section 194I (rent), Section 194A (interest), Section 194T (partner payments), and all other TDS sections except salary and property purchase. Form 16A is downloaded entirely from the TRACES portal by the deductor and distributed to the deductee. Form 16B is the TDS certificate specifically for property purchase TDS under Section 194IA — it is downloaded from TRACES by the property buyer and given to the seller.

Form 16A is downloaded by the deductor — not the deductee — from the TRACES portal at tdscpc.gov.in. The deductor must first ensure that the quarterly Form 26Q return has been filed and processed, and all challans have been matched in the return. Unmatched challans or PAN errors in the return prevent Form 16A generation.nnStep 1: Log in to TRACES at tdscpc.gov.in using TAN and password. Step 2: Navigate to Statements and Payments then select Form 16A. Step 3: Select the financial year, quarter, and the Form type as 16A. Step 4: Enter the PAN of the deductee for whom you want to generate the certificate, or select Bulk Download to generate for all deductees in that quarter. Step 5: Submit the request. TRACES processes it within a few minutes and makes the ZIP file available for download. Step 6: Download the ZIP file containing individual password-protected PDF certificates. Step 7: Distribute each PDF to the respective deductee via email or physical copy.nnThe password to open Form 16A is the deductee's PAN in uppercase letters followed by their date of birth in DDMMYYYY format without any spaces or separators. For example, if a vendor's PAN is ABCDE1234F and their date of birth is 15 March 1985, the password is ABCDE1234F15031985. This password format applies uniformly to all TRACES-generated TDS certificates. Form 16A must be distributed to deductees within 15 days of the quarterly return due date.

Form 16 is a two-part document and both parts are mandatory for a complete and valid TDS certificate for salary income. Part A is generated exclusively from the TRACES portal and cannot be prepared independently by the employer. It contains the employer's TAN and PAN, employee's PAN, quarterly summary of TDS deducted and deposited, unique TRACES certificate number, and a digital signature. Employers download Part A after filing and processing their quarterly Form 24Q returns — all four quarters must be filed before the final Part A covering the full year is generated.nnPart B of Form 16 is prepared by the employer internally and contains the detailed salary breakdown: gross salary, all Section 10 exemptions (HRA, LTA, other allowances), standard deduction, net taxable salary, all Chapter VI-A deductions actually allowed (80C, 80D, 80E, etc.), total taxable income, tax computed at applicable rates, Section 87A rebate, surcharge, cess, total tax payable, and TDS actually deducted and deposited. Part B must reconcile exactly with the TDS computations carried out during the year and reflected in Part A.nnFor employees who changed jobs during FY 2025-26, each employer issues a separate Form 16 covering only their period of employment. The employee must use both Form 16 certificates together when filing their ITR. The new employer should have collected Form 12B from the employee to include prior employer salary and TDS in their own deduction calculations — this prevents under or over-deduction across the year.

Form 16B is the TDS certificate for property purchase under Section 194IA. Unlike Form 16 and Form 16A which involve a deductor-deductee relationship, Form 16B is downloaded by the property buyer from TRACES and issued to the property seller. The buyer must complete Form 26QB filing and TDS deposit before Form 16B becomes available for download.nnSteps to download Form 16B: Log in to TRACES at tdscpc.gov.in. On the first-time login after Form 26QB, use the acknowledgement number of Form 26QB along with buyer PAN and date of birth to register on TRACES. After successful registration, navigate to Downloads then Form 16B. Select the relevant financial year, quarter, and enter the seller's PAN. Submit the download request. TRACES processes the request within a few minutes and the password-protected PDF is available for download. The password is the seller's PAN in uppercase followed by the seller's date of birth in DDMMYYYY format.nnForm 16B must be issued to the property seller within 15 days of the due date for filing Form 26QB. For a property payment made in July 2025 with Form 26QB due by 31 August 2025, Form 16B must be provided to the seller by 15 September 2025. The seller uses Form 16B to claim the 1% TDS credit while computing capital gains tax on the property sale in their ITR. Sellers who do not receive Form 16B from the buyer should first check if the buyer has filed Form 26QB and contact them with the TRACES acknowledgement details.

Errors in TDS certificates are more common than most businesses realise and can cause significant problems for deductees during ITR assessment. The most common error is a PAN mismatch — where the deductor quotes an incorrect PAN for the deductee in the TDS return, causing the TDS credit to appear in a wrong PAN's Form 26AS instead of the deductee's. This is resolved by filing a correction return on TRACES to update the PAN in the original quarterly return.nnThe second common error is a challan mismatch — where TDS was deposited under the wrong TAN or with a transcription error in the challan details, causing the deposit not to match against the return. This requires the deductor to raise a challan correction request on TRACES within the prescribed time window. A third error is incorrect financial year or quarter tagging — TDS deducted in March but reported in Q4 of the wrong financial year causes the deductee's annual Form 26AS to show missing credit.nnDeductees who find discrepancies between their actual TDS deducted and what appears in Form 26AS should first contact the deductor to verify the return filing status. If the deductor has filed the return with correct details but the credit still does not appear, the deductee can raise a grievance on the income tax portal. Filing ITR with the correct TDS amount supported by Form 16 or Form 16A even if Form 26AS shows a lower amount is acceptable — the AO can verify and allow the credit during processing.