GST for Homestays in India

GST is one of the most misunderstood parts of running a homestay, guest house or small hotel in India. Ask ten property owners whether they need to register for GST, and you will likely get ten different answers, most of them wrong. Some owners believe listing on Airbnb automatically means they must register. Others believe that because they run a “homestay” and not a “hotel,” GST simply does not apply to them. Neither is entirely true, and the gap between what owners assume and what the law actually says is where most of the trouble starts.

This guide walks through GST for homestays, guest houses, B&Bs and small resorts in India as it stands in 2026, after the GST 2.0 rate changes that came into effect on 22 September 2025. It covers who must register, what rate applies to your rooms, how bookings through Airbnb, MakeMyTrip and Booking.com are treated differently from direct bookings, what a compliant invoice looks like, and the mistakes that most commonly get flagged during a GST audit or notice.

GST for Homestays in India: Why It Confuses Owners

Part of the confusion is structural. GST for accommodation is not one rule, it is a stack of several rules that interact: a turnover threshold that decides if you register at all, a tariff-based rate slab that decides how much tax applies once you are registered, a separate set of provisions for anyone selling through an online platform, and a filing calendar that changes depending on which scheme you fall under. Miss one layer and the whole picture looks wrong.

The other part of the confusion is timing. The GST Council rationalised hotel and restaurant rates in September 2025, folding the old 12 percent and 18 percent slabs (and the separate exemption for very cheap rooms) into a simpler two-rate structure. A lot of advice still floating around online, including on hosting forums and old blog posts, refers to the pre-2025 rates. If you are reading anything about GST for hotels that mentions a 12 percent slab or a flat exemption for rooms under a thousand rupees, treat it as outdated.

Here is the short version of what actually matters for a homestay or small resort owner in 2026, before we get into each part in detail:

• GST registration depends on your annual turnover, not on how many platforms you list on, in most cases.
• Once registered, the rate on your rooms depends on the actual amount charged per night, not your published rate card.
• Selling through Airbnb, MakeMyTrip or a similar platform changes who collects and deposits the tax, not necessarily whether you personally need a GSTIN.
• The composition scheme, which many small businesses use to simplify GST, is not a realistic option for most homestays that list on OTAs.
• Filing deadlines and invoice formats are the same for a five-room homestay as for a 200-room hotel. GST does not have a small-business exemption from paperwork once you are registered.

Is GST Registration Mandatory for Your Homestay?

GST for homestays hinges almost entirely on this one number. This is the question owners ask first, and the honest answer is “it depends,” but the factors it depends on are specific and knowable. There are three separate rules at play here, and you need to check all three before deciding you are in the clear.

The Basic Turnover Threshold

Under Section 22 of the CGST Act, any supplier of services must register for GST once their aggregate turnover in a financial year crosses ₹20 lakh. If your property is in a special category state (Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura or Uttarakhand), the threshold drops to ₹10 lakh. Aggregate turnover here means all your taxable supplies added together across all your properties under the same PAN, not just the income from one homestay.

Below this threshold, registration is optional. Many small, single-room homestays with modest occupancy genuinely stay under ₹20 lakh a year and are not required to register at all, regardless of how they take bookings.

The Airbnb and OTA Confusion: E-commerce Operator Rules

This is where most of the confusion, and a fair amount of genuine frustration among homestay owners, comes from. There are two different rules that get mixed up constantly:

The registration rule. Section 24(ix) of the CGST Act historically required anyone supplying goods or services through an e-commerce operator to register compulsorily, regardless of turnover. However, Notification No. 65/2017-Central Tax specifically exempted suppliers of services (as opposed to goods) from this compulsory registration, as long as their turnover stays below the standard ₹20 lakh (or ₹10 lakh in Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura or Uttarakhand) threshold. On a plain reading of this notification, a small homestay listing only on Airbnb or MakeMyTrip and staying under the threshold is not legally compelled to register purely because of the listing.

The tax collection rule. Separately, accommodation services were brought under Section 9(5) of the CGST Act, which means that for bookings made through a notified e-commerce operator, the platform itself becomes liable to collect and deposit GST with the government, even on behalf of a supplier who is not registered. This is the same mechanism that applies to food delivery through Zomato and Swiggy, and cab rides through Uber and Ola. Practically, this means GST is still charged to your guest on an OTA booking whether or not you personally hold a GSTIN, because the platform handles that side of the tax.

Put together, the legal position for a small homestay under the threshold is that you are not automatically forced to register just because you list on a platform, but the platform still charges and remits GST on the booking regardless. In practice, however, several OTAs ask hosts to submit a GSTIN during onboarding as an internal compliance safeguard, which is part of why there has been visible pushback from homestay associations on this exact point, including a formal petition asking platforms and the government to simplify the rule for small operators.

If a platform you use insists on a GSTIN regardless of your turnover, that is a platform policy question as much as a legal one, and it is worth raising directly with their partner support team or a GST practitioner before assuming you have no choice.

When You Must Register Even Below the Threshold

A few situations override the basic threshold and require registration regardless of your turnover:

• You supply accommodation from properties in more than one state under the same business, since GST registration is state-wise.
• You voluntarily opt to register even though you are under the threshold, usually to claim input tax credit or because corporate and government guests insist on a GST invoice.

If none of these apply and your turnover is genuinely below ₹20 lakh (or ₹10 lakh in Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura or Uttarakhand), you can legally operate without a GSTIN. The moment you cross that line, mid-year, registration becomes mandatory within 30 days of crossing the threshold, not from the start of the next financial year.

GST Rates for Homestay and Hotel Rooms in 2026

The ₹7,500 Tariff Line

Since the GST 2.0 rate rationalisation took effect on 22 September 2025, accommodation services follow a simple two-rate structure based on the amount actually charged per room per night:

Room Tariff (per night)	GST Rate	Input Tax Credit
Up to ₹7,500	5%	Not available
Above ₹7,500	18%	Available

Before this change, the earlier structure had a separate exemption for rooms under ₹1,000 a night and a 12 percent slab for the mid-range. Both of those have been folded into the current 5 percent bracket. If your homestay charges anywhere from a few hundred rupees to ₹7,500 a night, and that covers the overwhelming majority of homestays, guest houses and budget resorts in India, you fall in the 5 percent bracket and you cannot claim input tax credit on that portion of your business, even though you are charging and depositing GST.

This last point catches a lot of owners out. A common assumption is that once you are GST-registered, you can offset the GST you pay on furniture, linen, kitchen equipment, software subscriptions and renovation work against the GST you collect from guests. In the 5 percent bracket, you generally cannot. The 5 percent rate is specifically structured as a no-ITC rate, similar to how restaurant GST has worked for several years. Only properties charging above ₹7,500 a night, and paying 18 percent, get to claim ITC on their inputs.

How the Rate Is Actually Calculated

The rate is determined by the actual transaction value, meaning what the guest is actually charged for that specific night, not your rack rate or the tariff printed on your website. If your standard rate is ₹8,000 but you run a monsoon discount and the guest actually pays ₹6,500, that booking falls in the 5 percent bracket. If you have a premium suite that occasionally sells above ₹7,500 during peak season while your standard rooms stay below it, different bookings on the same property can legitimately attract different GST rates on different nights. Your billing system needs to apply the rate based on what was actually charged, invoice by invoice, not a single fixed rate for the whole property.

GST on Food, Add-ons and Bundled Packages

When breakfast, meals or other services are bundled into a single room package and billed as one line item, the accommodation rate usually applies to the whole package, since the room is treated as the principal supply. If food is billed separately, as its own line item on the invoice, it is generally taxed on its own terms as a restaurant-type supply.

Extras like airport pickup, guided treks, bonfire nights or laundry, when billed separately, are typically taxed as independent services at their own applicable rate, most often 18 percent, rather than automatically following the room rate. If you regularly bundle add-ons into your packages, it is worth getting your invoicing template checked by a CA so that room revenue, food revenue and service revenue are split correctly and not accidentally taxed at the wrong rate as a whole.

Who Actually Pays the GST: OTA Bookings vs Direct Bookings

When a Guest Books Through Airbnb, MakeMyTrip or Booking.com

For bookings made through a platform notified as an e-commerce operator under Section 9(5), the platform is responsible for collecting GST from the guest and depositing it with the government, treating itself as though it were the supplier for tax purposes. This applies whether or not you, the property owner, hold a GSTIN. If you are registered, the mechanics of how the platform reports this against your GSTIN vary by platform, and it is worth checking your specific OTA partner dashboard or agreement rather than assuming it works the same way everywhere.

Airbnb, for instance, publishes host-facing guidance explaining that it remits GST directly to tax authorities on eligible bookings under Section 9(5), and that registered hosts need to add their GSTIN to their account settings to avoid the platform charging tax twice.

When a Guest Books Directly With You

A direct booking, whether it comes through your own website, a WhatsApp conversation, a phone call or a walk-in, is not routed through an e-commerce operator, so Section 9(5) does not apply to it at all. If you are registered for GST, you are personally responsible for charging the correct rate, issuing a compliant invoice, and depositing the tax yourself through your regular returns. If you are not registered because you are under the threshold, no GST applies to that booking regardless of the channel.

This is one of the underappreciated practical differences between OTA bookings and direct bookings. On an OTA booking, a fair amount of the tax handling happens inside the platform’s systems, somewhat invisibly to you. On a direct booking, the entire responsibility, and the entire audit trail, sits with your own invoicing and your own GST returns.

Neither is inherently better from a compliance standpoint, but it does mean that if you are shifting more of your business toward direct bookings, whether through your own booking engine, WhatsApp or a tool like OpenStays, you need your own invoicing to be doing correctly what the OTA used to handle for you automatically. This is a genuine operational shift, not just a revenue one, and it is worth planning for rather than discovering the gap during a return filing.

How to Register for GST as a Homestay Owner

GST for homestays follows a fairly standard registration process once you decide to register. If you have decided to register, either because you have crossed the threshold or because you want the benefits of voluntary registration, the process runs entirely through the GST portal (gst.gov.in). Here is what the process typically involves:

• Gather your documents. PAN card, Aadhaar of the proprietor or partners, address proof of the business premises (electricity bill, property tax receipt or rent agreement), a passport-size photograph, bank account details with a cancelled cheque or bank statement, and proof of business constitution if you operate as a partnership or private limited company.
• File Form GST REG-01. This is the main registration application, filed online, where you declare your business details, the nature of your supply (accommodation services), your turnover estimate and your principal place of business.
• Verification. A GST officer may seek clarification or physically verify the premises in some cases, particularly for new registrations. Aadhaar-authenticated applications are generally processed faster than non-authenticated ones.
• GSTIN issuance. Once approved, you receive a 15-digit GST Identification Number (GSTIN), specific to the state your property is registered in. If you run properties in more than one state, you need a separate GSTIN for each state.
• Update your booking and billing systems. Your GSTIN needs to be reflected on your invoices, on your OTA partner dashboards where applicable, and on your website or booking engine if you display pricing with tax breakdowns.

Registration itself does not cost anything on the government portal. Many owners choose to have a Chartered Accountant or GST practitioner handle the filing to avoid errors in classification or turnover declaration, particularly if their business also includes food service, event hosting or other supplies alongside room rental.

SAC Codes and GST Invoices for Homestays

SAC Codes You Need to Know

Services under GST are classified using Services Accounting Codes (SAC), similar to how goods use HSN codes. For accommodation businesses, the two codes that come up most often are:

Service	SAC Code
Room or unit accommodation services	996311
Restaurant and food services billed separately	996332

Using the correct SAC code matters because it is what your GST returns and invoices are matched against during scrutiny. Mixing up accommodation and restaurant codes, or leaving the SAC field blank, is a common and easily avoidable error.

What a Valid GST Invoice Must Include

Once registered, every taxable booking needs a proper tax invoice, not just a printed receipt or a WhatsApp message confirming payment. A compliant invoice needs to show:

• Your legal business name, address and GSTIN
• A sequential invoice number, unique for the financial year, without gaps
• The guest’s name and address (mandatory for invoices above a certain value, and good practice below it)
• The SAC code for the service supplied
• The check-in and check-out dates
• The taxable value, the GST rate applied, and the tax amount split as CGST and SGST for an in-state guest, or IGST for an out-of-state or foreign guest
• The place of supply, which for accommodation is the location of the property itself, not the guest’s home address

If you are still issuing handwritten receipts or basic PDF invoices without a GST breakup, this is usually the first thing a GST auditor or a corporate guest’s finance team will flag. Most billing software and PMS platforms can generate compliant invoices automatically once your GSTIN and rate structure are configured correctly, which removes a lot of the manual error risk.

GST Return Filing Once You Are Registered

Monthly and Quarterly Returns

Registered businesses typically file two recurring returns. GSTR-1 reports your outward supplies (your sales, essentially every invoice you have issued) and is generally due by the 11th of the following month for monthly filers. GSTR-3B is your summary return, where you declare total tax liability and pay it, generally due by the 20th of the following month for monthly filers. Small taxpayers below a specified turnover can opt into the QRMP scheme (Quarterly Return, Monthly Payment), which allows quarterly filing of GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B while still depositing tax monthly through a simplified challan. Many single-property homestays find QRMP genuinely reduces their compliance workload compared to monthly filing.

Annual Return

Businesses with turnover above ₹2 crore in a financial year are generally required to file an annual return, GSTR-9, by 31 December following the end of that financial year. Below that threshold, annual filing has been optional in several recent years, though this is one of the details that shifts with each year’s notifications, so it is worth confirming your specific obligation on the GST portal or with your CA each year rather than assuming last year’s rule still applies.

Why the Composition Scheme Rarely Works for Homestays

GST offers a composition scheme for small service providers with turnover up to ₹50 lakh, allowing a flat, simplified rate in place of the regular slab system, with quarterly payments and a single simplified annual return instead of monthly filings. On paper, this sounds ideal for a small homestay. In practice, a business is barred from the composition scheme the moment it supplies through an e-commerce operator that is required to collect tax at source.

Since the large majority of homestays in India list on at least one OTA, most homestay owners who cross the registration threshold end up in the regular scheme by default, not because they chose it, but because listing on Airbnb, MakeMyTrip or a similar platform rules out the simplified alternative. This is worth knowing before you assume composition is available to you, since discovering the disqualification after applying causes avoidable delays.

GST on Commission Paid to OTAs

When you pay commission to an OTA for a booking, that commission is itself a taxable supply, and how it is taxed depends on where the platform is based. Indian OTAs, such as MakeMyTrip or Goibibo, typically raise their own GST invoice for the commission charged to you, and if you are registered and the 18 percent bracket applies to your rooms, you can generally claim input tax credit on that commission GST. If your rooms fall in the 5 percent no-ITC bracket, that commission GST becomes a straightforward cost, since you cannot offset it.

For platforms based outside India, the position is different and more easily missed. Commission paid to a foreign platform can fall under the reverse charge mechanism for import of services, meaning the Indian property owner, if registered, may be liable to pay GST on that commission directly to the government, rather than the foreign platform charging it.

This is a genuinely easy thing to overlook, since there is often no local invoice prompting you to notice the tax event. If a meaningful share of your bookings comes through an internationally headquartered platform, it is worth having a CA specifically review whether reverse charge applies to your commission payments, since the treatment can vary based on how the platform structures its Indian operations.

Why Homestays Do Not Get the “Renting a House” GST Exemption

A specific point of confusion deserves its own section, because it comes up often among homestay owners who also rent out property on a long-term basis. GST law does exempt “services by way of renting of residential dwelling for use as residence.” Owners sometimes read this and assume it covers their homestay too, since a homestay is, after all, a residential property being rented out.

It does not work that way in practice. The residential dwelling exemption is meant for long-term, residence-style tenancies, someone renting a flat to live in for months or years, not short-stay, per-night commercial accommodation. A guest booking your homestay for two nights over a weekend is using it as a place to stay, not as their residence, and you are operating it as a commercial hospitality service, complete with housekeeping, check-in and check-out cycles and nightly pricing. Tax authorities and case law have consistently treated this as accommodation service, taxable under the same rules as a hotel room, not as exempt residential renting.

The distinction matters because it is the same underlying logic used in other compliance areas, including guest identification and local hotel licensing, where the line is drawn between a tenancy and a short stay. If you are structuring part of your property as a long-term rental and part as a nightly homestay, keep the two income streams and their documentation clearly separate, since mixing them can create confusion for both GST purposes and for local municipal or police registration requirements.

Common GST Mistakes Homestay Owners Make

Most GST for homestays problems trace back to one of these avoidable errors. These are the errors that come up repeatedly, whether in casual conversation among hosts, on hosting forums, or during an actual GST notice.

Not tracking turnover across properties. If you run two homestays under the same PAN, their turnover is combined for the ₹20 lakh threshold calculation, even if they operate under different brand names or are managed separately. Owners sometimes track each property’s income separately and miss that the combined total has crossed the line.

Applying the old rate structure. Some owners, and even some older invoicing templates, are still charging 12 percent or working with the old sub-₹1,000 exemption from before September 2025. Both no longer exist. Check that your billing system reflects the current 5 percent and 18 percent structure.

Charging GST on the published tariff instead of the actual price paid. If you discount a room from ₹9,000 to ₹7,000 for a slow season booking, GST applies on ₹7,000, at 5 percent, not on the ₹9,000 rack rate at 18 percent. Charging tax on the wrong base is one of the more common errors flagged during reviews.

Claiming input tax credit in the 5 percent bracket. Since the 5 percent rate is a no-ITC rate, claiming credit on furniture, renovation or software purchases against 5 percent output tax is not permitted and will be reversed if caught, usually with interest.

Assuming composition scheme eligibility without checking the e-commerce exclusion. As covered above, listing on an OTA that collects tax at source generally disqualifies you from the composition scheme, regardless of your turnover being under ₹50 lakh.

Not issuing GST-compliant invoices for direct bookings. It is easy to get used to the OTA handling invoicing automatically and then forget that a direct booking, paid by UPI or bank transfer, still needs a proper tax invoice with your GSTIN, SAC code and tax breakup if you are registered.

Missing the 30-day registration deadline after crossing the threshold. Registration is not automatic and is not backdated to the start of the year. Once you cross ₹20 lakh (or ₹10 lakh in Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura or Uttarakhand) in aggregate turnover, you have 30 days to apply.

Ignoring reverse charge on foreign OTA commissions. As discussed above, this is one of the least visible obligations, precisely because there is no local invoice reminding you it applies.

Penalties for GST Non-Compliance

GST for homestays comes with real financial consequences when deadlines slip. GST penalties are structured to punish both the failure to register and the failure to pay correctly, and they can stack.

Violation	Consequence
Failure to register when required	Penalty under Section 122 of the CGST Act, generally the higher of ₹10,000 or the amount of tax evaded.
Late payment of tax	Interest, generally at 18% per annum, calculated from the due date until the date of actual payment.
Excess or wrongful input tax credit claims	Interest at a higher rate, along with reversal of the credit claimed.
Late filing of returns	A late fee charged per day of delay, with caps that vary by turnover slab and are revised periodically.
Issuing invoices without a valid GSTIN, or with incorrect tax details	Can attract penalties separately from the registration and payment issues above.

Beyond the direct monetary penalties, an unresolved GST notice or a pattern of non-compliance can complicate renewal of other licences and registrations tied to your property, and can affect your standing with OTA partners who increasingly cross-check GSTIN validity during onboarding and renewal.

GST Planning for a Growing Homestay Business

Planning GST for homestays early prevents last minute scrambling as bookings grow. A few practical, forward-looking points come up often once owners understand the basic rules.

Should you register voluntarily before crossing the threshold? Some owners choose to register even while under ₹20 lakh, usually because corporate travellers, government departments or larger travel agents will only book properties that can issue a GST invoice, or because they plan to claim input tax credit on a major renovation or a new construction project. Voluntary registration is allowed and can make commercial sense, but it also means taking on the full filing calendar immediately, so weigh the administrative load against the business case.

Watch the ₹7,500 line deliberately. If your rooms hover close to ₹7,500 a night, small pricing decisions, a service charge, a mandatory breakfast add-on, a festive season markup, can push a booking from the 5 percent no-ITC bracket into the 18 percent bracket with ITC, or vice versa. This is worth modelling out with your CA if you are setting seasonal or dynamic pricing, since the tax treatment changes the effective margin, not just the headline price.

Track turnover across the full financial year, not just the busy season. A resort with a strong four-month season can cross ₹20 lakh well before the calendar year ends, even if the rest of the year is quiet. Registration triggers on a rolling aggregate, not a seasonal average.

Keep OTA and direct booking revenue separately reconciled. Even though the tax collection mechanism differs between OTA and direct bookings, both count toward your aggregate turnover for threshold purposes, and both need to show up correctly in your books when your CA prepares your returns.

How OpenStays Helps With GST-Ready Operations

GST for homestays becomes far easier to manage with the right systems in place. OpenStays is not a GST filing or accounting tool, and it will not replace your CA. What it does help with is the operational side that GST compliance depends on: knowing exactly what you charged, for which room, on which night, and through which channel.

Every direct booking made through OpenStays, whether the guest arrives through your WhatsApp number, your booking link or your website, is logged with the actual amount charged, the dates, and the guest details, giving you a clean record to hand to your accountant instead of reconstructing it from chat threads and bank statements at return-filing time. Because OpenStays charges 0% commission on bookings and never sits in the payment path, your guest pays you directly, which means your turnover and invoicing responsibility are always clear and yours, without a platform-side deduction to reconcile separately.

The dashboard also gives you visibility into your booking value by date, which is useful groundwork for tracking how close you are to the ₹20 lakh threshold through the year, or for understanding how many of your nights are falling above or below the ₹7,500 tariff line as you plan pricing. None of this replaces a proper GST return or a CA’s advice, but it does mean the underlying data is accurate and exportable when you need it, rather than scattered across an OTA dashboard, a UPI app and a notebook at the front desk.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need GST registration if I only have two rooms and list only on Airbnb?

Not automatically. If your aggregate turnover is below ₹20 lakh a year (₹10 lakh in Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura or Uttarakhand), you are generally not required to register purely because of the Airbnb listing, since Notification 65/2017 exempts small service suppliers on e-commerce platforms from the compulsory registration rule. Airbnb will still collect and remit GST on the booking itself under Section 9(5) rules, separately from your own registration status. If your turnover crosses the threshold, registration becomes mandatory regardless of channel.

What GST rate applies to a homestay room priced at ₹3,500 a night?

5 percent, without input tax credit, since it falls below the ₹7,500 tariff line introduced under the GST 2.0 rate structure effective September 2025.

Is the old GST exemption for rooms under ₹1,000 still available?

No. That separate exemption slab was removed as part of the September 2025 rate rationalisation. Rooms priced under ₹1,000 now fall into the same 5 percent bracket as any other room up to ₹7,500.

Can I claim input tax credit on renovation costs for my homestay?

Only if your rooms are taxed in the 18 percent bracket, meaning your actual nightly charge exceeds ₹7,500. If your rooms fall in the 5 percent bracket, input tax credit is not available, even on legitimate business expenses like renovation, furniture or software.

Do I charge GST differently for a foreign guest versus an Indian guest?

The rate itself (5 percent or 18 percent based on tariff) does not change based on the guest’s nationality. What can change is whether the transaction is treated as CGST plus SGST or as IGST, depending on the place of supply rules, though for accommodation the place of supply is generally the location of the property itself.

Is the composition scheme a good option for my homestay?

Usually not, if you list on any OTA that collects tax at source, since that disqualifies you from the composition scheme regardless of your turnover being under the ₹50 lakh limit for services. It can be worth exploring only if you take exclusively direct bookings and stay under that turnover cap, and even then, a CA should confirm eligibility before you apply.

What happens if I do not register even after crossing ₹20 lakh in turnover?

You become liable for a penalty under Section 122 of the CGST Act, generally the higher of ₹10,000 or the tax amount evaded, along with interest on unpaid tax and the risk of the tax department raising a demand for the entire unregistered period, not just from the date of detection.

Does switching from OTA bookings to direct bookings change my GST liability?

Not in terms of whether GST applies. It changes who is responsible for collecting and remitting it. On OTA bookings, the platform typically handles this under Section 9(5) rules. On direct bookings, if you are registered, that responsibility sits with you, including issuing your own compliant invoices.

In Summary

GST for homestays is not one rule but a stack of them: a turnover threshold that decides whether you register, a tariff-based rate that decides how much you charge once registered, a separate e-commerce mechanism that decides who collects tax on OTA bookings, and a filing calendar that applies once you are in the system. The September 2025 rate change simplified the rate structure itself, down to a clean 5 percent below ₹7,500 and 18 percent above it, but it did not simplify the surrounding registration and filing questions, which is where most owners still get tripped up.

The practical path forward is the same one that works for most compliance topics in this industry: know your actual turnover on a rolling basis, know which bracket your rooms fall into based on what guests actually pay, keep your invoicing accurate whether the booking came through a platform or directly, and get a CA to confirm anything involving reverse charge, composition scheme eligibility or multi-state operations, since these are the areas where a small misjudgement compounds over a full financial year.

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This guide is intended as an informational resource for accommodation operators in India. It does not constitute tax or legal advice. GST rules, rates and thresholds are subject to change through government notifications. Consult a qualified Chartered Accountant or GST practitioner for advice specific to your property and situation.