GST Invoicing for Travel Agents in India: A Plain-English Guide
CGST vs SGST vs IGST, the 5% tour-operator scheme, when to charge what, and why your invoice numbering matters. Everything an Indian travel agency needs to invoice without a fight with your CA.
GST is the part of running a travel agency that no one started the business for. But getting it wrong means either over-paying tax or a stressful month-end with your CA. Here's the plain-English version — not legal advice, but enough to know what your software should be doing for you.
The two GST schemes for tour operators
As a tour operator, you broadly have two options:
- 5% without Input Tax Credit (ITC) — you charge customers 5% GST and cannot claim credit on your input costs (hotels, transport). Simplest, most common for pure tour packages.
- 18% with ITC — you charge 18% and claim credit on inputs. Makes sense when your input GST is high and your customers are businesses who want the credit.
Most pilgrimage and leisure operators run the 5% no-ITC scheme because their customers are individuals who don't care about ITC and the math is simpler. Pick one, be consistent, and tell your software which one you're on.
CGST + SGST vs IGST — the one rule that trips everyone up
This is the rule that causes the most invoice errors:
- Customer in your state → split the tax into CGST + SGST (half each).
- Customer in a different state → charge IGST (the full amount as one line).
Example: you're a Delhi agency (state code 07).
- A Delhi customer's ₹1,00,000 trip at 5% → ₹2,500 CGST + ₹2,500 SGST.
- A Mumbai customer's same trip → ₹5,000 IGST.
How does the software know? From the state code — the first two digits of the GSTIN. If your GSTIN starts with 07 and your customer's starts with 27, it's interstate → IGST. If the customer has no GSTIN (a regular traveller), you default to your own state → CGST + SGST.
Tripaay does this split automatically the moment you generate an invoice. You never do the arithmetic.
Why your invoice numbering matters more than you think
Under GST law, invoice numbers must be:
- Sequential — no gaps, no jumping around
- Unique per financial year
- Consecutive within a series
The Indian financial year runs April to March, so a clean format is INV/2026-27/0001, INV/2026-27/0002, and so on. When the new FY starts in April, you reset to 0001 under the new year prefix.
If you're hand-numbering invoices in Excel, this is exactly where mistakes creep in — a duplicate number, a gap, a wrong year. During a GST audit, these are the first things that get flagged. Software that generates the number for you, locked to the financial year, removes the entire risk.
HSN / SAC code for travel services
Travel arrangement and tour operator services fall under SAC code 9985. Your invoices should carry it. (HSN is for goods; SAC is the services equivalent — same field on the invoice.)
What good invoicing software does for you
You shouldn't be thinking about any of the above per invoice. The software should:
- Know your GSTIN and scheme
- Read the customer's state from their GSTIN (or default to yours)
- Split CGST/SGST vs IGST automatically
- Generate the next sequential FY-locked invoice number
- Stamp SAC 9985
- Produce a clean PDF your customer's accountant accepts
- Keep a permanent record (including voided invoices) for the audit trail
That's exactly what Tripaay's invoicing does — generated straight from a booking, in two clicks.
This is general guidance, not tax advice — check specifics with your CA. Tripaay generates GST-compliant invoices automatically from your bookings. Try it free for 14 days.