granted to set up an office in India by Indian Authorities. At present, PAN Service Centres are located in India only. However, foreign citizens may find the pseudo online mode of application more inconvenient. Signed physical documents must be sent by postal mail or courier to the Protean (formerly NSDL eGov) PO Box in Pune (India) or UTIITSL address in Mumbai, New Delhi, Chennai, or Kolkata. The online facility allows payment of fees in INR using limited options of credit card for foreign citizens (only if they have India based credit card as international credit cards are not always accepted by the third party fee collectors.) Unlike most countries, India charges a fee to issue a TIN (PAN ID). The fees charges are ₹107 if the PAN card is to be received in India and ₹989 if the PAN Card is to be received at a foreign location. Note that the online application only eliminates data entry errors. One still needs to mail the application with photographs to India-based centers. The application requires two photographs. One on the top right requires a signature within the box below it. The other one on the top left requires a signature across the photograph (such that part of the signature is on the photograph and part on the form). There is anywhere from 2 to 20 days lag between your documents reaching the center and the initial processing/verification which only takes a day. The actual issue of PAN number by the tax department is within 48 hours. The actual PAN card is sent to the overseas address by the registered/certified mail and may take additional 2 weeks after the issue of the PAN number which is initially conveyed by email. Although there are only 58 million income tax payers in India, yet there are 445 million genuine PANs issued as of 31 March 2019. While the alphanumeric PAN number is unique, individuals and corporate entities have been able to obtain multiple PAN cards fraudulently. It is illegal to obtain multiple PANs and there is a penalty of when caught. In addition, there are fake PAN cards due to ubiquitous plastic card printers. Additionally, illegal immigrants have also got PAN cards issued to them; most have used the services of PAN card agents. There are only two entities in India that are authorized to accept PAN applications for processing on behalf of the Income