How to record Swiggy, Zomato and direct orders in one set of books

Record every Swiggy and Zomato order at its full food value as a sale, and record the app's commission, fees, the GST on those fees and the TDS as separate lines, so that the sales minus the deductions equals the payout in your bank. Your WhatsApp and phone orders go in the same books as ordinary taxable sales, because on those you charge the GST yourself.

On an app order, the app bills the customer and pays the 5% GST. On a direct order you do both. Below is one week of a registered kitchen's orders, the returns tables each figure goes to, and four things other guides get wrong.

How does Swiggy and Zomato accounting work for a restaurant?

Start with who does what. Under section 9(5) of the CGST Act, read with Notification 17/2021-Central Tax (Rate), the app pays the GST on restaurant service sold through it. CBIC's Circular 167/23/2021-GST adds that the invoice for that service "will be issued by ECO" (the e-commerce operator, meaning the app). So the app bills the customer, collects the 5% and pays it in cash.

The sale is still yours. The same circular says the value of those supplies counts in your aggregate turnover "for threshold consideration or any other purpose in the Act". The app is a service provider to you, and it charges you for that service.

That gives three kinds of line in your books:

1. Sales through the app, at the food value before any deduction. No GST payable by you.
2. What the app charges you: commission, other fees, the GST on them, and TDS. These come off the payout.
3. Direct sales, billed by you, with 5% GST that you owe. A catering order you take yourself is a direct sale too, but outdoor catering has its own rate entry, so confirm its rate with your CA.

Fig. 1 shows where the money goes for each kind of order, using the worked week below.

What does one week of app and WhatsApp orders look like?

Take a registered home kitchen in one state, for the week of 5 to 11 Oct 2026. The commission and fee rates here are made up for the example. Yours are in your partner agreement and on the app's statement.

• App orders: food value ₹20,000. The customers also paid 5% GST, ₹1,000, to the app.
• WhatsApp orders: ₹8,400 received by UPI, on prices that include GST.

On the app side, assume a 20% commission and ₹400 of other fees:

The ₹1,000 GST the customers paid never appears in your books. It was the app's to collect and the app's to pay.

On the direct side, ₹8,400 includes 5% GST, so the food value is ₹8,400 ÷ 1.05 = ₹8,000 and the tax is ₹400 (₹200 CGST and ₹200 SGST). Our post on working out GST from an inclusive menu price shows that sum step by step.

Here is the whole week in one set of books:

Check it: sales ₹28,000 plus GST collected ₹400, minus ₹4,400, ₹792 and ₹20, is ₹23,188. That matches the money that reached you, so nothing is missing. Your turnover for the week is ₹28,000, not the ₹23,188 that landed in the bank.

How do you reconcile a Swiggy or Zomato payout with your orders?

Do it every payout, not at year end. Each step catches a different problem:

1. Count the orders. Match the number of delivered orders and their food value on the app's statement against the order history in your partner app for the same dates.
2. Check every deduction against your agreement. Commission at the agreed rate, fees you recognise, GST at the rate shown on the app's tax invoice to you.
3. Find the extras. Discounts you agreed to fund, refunds for cancelled or complained-about orders and penalties appear as their own lines. Note each one with the order it belongs to.
4. Match the bank. The payout on the statement should equal the credit in your bank account, on or near the date shown.
5. Keep the app's invoices. The app issues you a tax invoice for its commission and fees, usually monthly. Your CA needs it, and it is your proof of the ₹792-type GST line.

That warning is why Pocket Journal for Food does not record app orders. It bills your WhatsApp and phone orders: each bill carries its CGST and SGST and posts to the day book in the same step. Its GST report adds up taxable value and tax by rate for your bills only, which is exactly the Table 3.1(a) half of your return. Kitchen costs go in as expenses with a category and the supplier's bill number. The app half stays in the app's weekly statements and invoices, and your CA puts the two together.

Can you claim GST input credit on Swiggy and Zomato commission?

Not if your kitchen pays 5% on restaurant service, and most home and cloud kitchens do. That rate, inserted into Notification 11/2017-Central Tax (Rate) by Notification 46/2017-Central Tax (Rate), applies on condition that credit of input tax charged on goods and services used in supplying the service has not been taken. The app's commission is a service you use to supply the food, so the GST on it cannot be claimed back. The 56th GST Council also confirmed that a standalone restaurant cannot opt for 18% with credit.

Pages that say a registered restaurant can claim this credit are describing a hotel restaurant paying 18% with credit, not a home kitchen.

The 57th GST Council did recommend a limited credit for restaurant service, but its FAQ (Q28 to Q30) says it covers only "the same category of input service", meaning restaurant service bought to resell. An app's commission is not that, and the recommendation was not law on 18 Oct 2026.

Do Swiggy and Zomato deduct TCS or TDS from your payout?

Two different taxes get mixed up here.

TCS under GST: no. Circular 167 says the apps "will no longer be required to collect TCS and file GSTR 8 in respect of restaurant services on which it pays tax". Guides that still show a 1% TCS line on food payouts are describing the rules before 1 Jan 2022.

TDS under income tax: yes. An e-commerce operator deducts TDS on the gross amount of a seller's sales through it. The rate has been 0.1% since 1 Oct 2024, not the 1% some pages still quote. From 1 Apr 2026 the provision sits in section 393(1) of the Income-tax Act, 2025 (table entry 8(v)), which replaced the old section 194-O. In the example, 0.1% of ₹20,000 is ₹20.

TDS is not a cost. It is income tax paid in advance on your behalf, and your CA claims it against your tax in the income tax return. Check that the TDS on your payout statements matches the TDS shown against your PAN in your tax credit statement on the income tax portal. Whether a small-seller exemption applies to you is a question for your CA.

Where do app sales go in GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B?

In GSTR-3B, Table 3.1.1(ii) exists for exactly these supplies. GSTN's advisory on Table 3.1.1 says a registered person selling through an app "shall report such supplies in Table 3.1.1(ii) and shall not include such supplies in Table 3.1(a)", and "is not required to pay tax on such supplies".

In GSTR-1, from the January 2024 tax period, you report them as a summary against the app's GSTIN in Table 14(b). GSTN's advisory on Tables 14 and 15 says those values "will be auto-populated to Table 3.1.1(ii) of GSTR-3B".

For the week in the example, ₹20,000 goes to Table 3.1.1(ii) and ₹8,000 with ₹200 CGST and ₹200 SGST goes to Table 3.1(a).

Circular 167 had told kitchens to use Table 8 of GSTR-1 and Table 3.1(c) of GSTR-3B "for the time being". Pages that still say so are out of date: Table 3.1.1 went live on 1 Aug 2022 and Table 14 from the January 2024 period.

What if your kitchen is not registered for GST yet?

You still need the same books. App sales count towards the ₹20 lakh registration limit at their food value, and your WhatsApp orders count too. A kitchen that only looks at its payouts will undercount and may cross the line without knowing. Our post on GST registration for home kitchens on Swiggy and Zomato has the limit, the law and a month-by-month example.

Without registration you charge no GST on direct orders, so a direct order is simply a sale at its price. If you do register later, the 57th GST Council changes are worth a read for what has been recommended on returns and penalties, and our guide to sending a GST bill on WhatsApp covers what your direct bills must then show.