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PAN is a ten-digit unique alphanumeric number issued by the Income Tax Department. The primary purpose of the PAN is to bring a universal identification to all financial transactions and to prevent tax evasion by keeping track of monetary transactions, especially those of high-net-worth individuals who can impact the economy.

Structure of PAN

The PAN (or PAN number) is a ten-character long alpha-numeric unique identifier.

Example: AAAPZ1234C

• The first three characters of the code are three letters forming a sequence of alphabets letters from AAA to ZZZ
• The first five characters are letters in uppercase, followed by four numerals, and the last (tenth) character is a letter.
• Fourth character [P — Individual or Person ] identifies the type of holder of the card. Each holder type is uniquely defined by a letter from the list below:
  • A — Association of persons (AOP)
  • B — Body of individuals (BOI)
  • C — Company
  • F — Firm
  • G — Government
  • H — HUF (Hindu undivided family)
  • L — Local authority
  • J — Artificial juridical person
  • P — Individual or Person
  • T — Trust (AOP)
• The fifth character of the PAN is the first character of either:
  • Surname or last name of the person, in the case of a "personal" PAN card, where the fourth character is "P" or
  • of the name of the entity, trust, society, or organization in the case of a company/HUF/firm/AOP/trust/BOI/local authority/artificial judicial person/government, where the fourth character is "C", "H", "F", "A", "T", "B", "L", "J", "G".
• The last (tenth) character is an alphabetic digit used as a check-sum to verify the validity of that current code.