All You Need to Know About UDIN (Unique Document Identification Number) by Chartered Accountants in Practice

As we all know, on 28th December 2020 ICAI has released a notification and decided to allow one-time condonation to its members for their earlier missed or late generated UDINs. Let us understand what UDIN actually means.

Unique Document Identification Number (UDIN) by CA

Unique Document Identification Number (UDIN) is a unique number given to documents attested by Chartered Accountants in Practice. It is 18 digits system-generated unique number that shall be generated separately for each document.

Applicability

ICAI has mandated all CA in practice to obtain UDIN for all the certificates issued by them if the Financial information or any other content is certified as depicting a True and Fair view. The CA firms cannot register themselves on the UDIN portal. Chartered Accountants having full-time Certificate of Practice can register on UDIN Portal and generate UDIN by registering the certificates attested/certified by them.

UDIN is being made mandatory from 1st July 2019 on all Corporate/ Non- Corporate Audit, Attest, and Assurance Functions.

The UDIN generated by CA can be searched in an online UDIN portal through the search option by giving the Name, Contact, and Email id of the person requesting the information. This will ensure the authenticity of the documents being certified by the CA members and can be relied upon by Stakeholders, Banking, and various other regulating authorities.

What does UDIN depict?

The UDIN will be an 18 digit alphanumeric number which depicts as follows:

The first two digits represent the last 2 digits of the current year (For instance, 19 for the year 2019).

The next 6 digits will be the membership number of the CA Member.

The next 10 digits are alphanumeric digits randomly generated by the system

When the CA in practice has to generate UDIN?

The UDIN has to be generated within 60 days from the date of signing or attesting the documents by the CA in practice and it cannot be done beyond 60 days from the date of signing.

Limit on the generation of UDIN

The council has not put any limit on the number of UDIN a CA can generate. Further, the generated UDIN shall not have any expiry unless revoked by the authority.

Precautions while generating UDIN and signing documents

When the chartered accountant is required to sign several documents under their one audit, the same UDIN shall be used for documents coming under one assignment.

The UDIN shall be only generated by the person signing the certificate. Any partner of the firm cannot generate UDIN on behalf of other signing partners.

UDIN shall not require to be obtained for certified true copies given.

If duplicate certificates are being issued as per the client’s request, then the same UDIN mentioned in the original certificates has to be mentioned.

UDIN shall be required to generate for both physically signed as well as digitally signed certificates online. The UDIN so generated for certificates signed digitally shall be retained by the CA in practice and shall be furnished in case of any inspection by the authority.

UDIN generated shall be mentioned after every signature and membership number of the CA in practice.

How UDIN is reflected?

The 18- digits UDIN  will be like - 19304576AKTSBN1359 Wherein the First 2 Digits are the Last 2 digits of the Current Year (19 in this case. The next 6 Digits are ICAI Membership No. (304576 in this case). The next 10 Digits are Alpha-numeric generated randomly by the system (AKTSBN1359)

What kind of Documents UDIN is applicable to?

UDIN will be applicable both for manually as well as digitally signed Reports (like MCA Forms, 15CB) which are uploaded online. In case of no field for mentioning UDIN on digitally signed online reports, UDIN has to be generated and retained for providing the same on being asked by the stakeholders.

Consequence of default

The chartered accountant in practice who defaults in generating UDIN for mandatory documents shall face disciplinary actions as per Second Schedule Part II of The Chartered Accountants Act, 1949.