The money in one order
Worked example — a ₹1,000 order, commission 25% (an example rate)
Of the ₹1,000 the menu said, ₹704 reaches the bank, and ₹1 of the difference comes back to you as a tax credit. Everything else in your agreement — a payment-collection charge, advertising you opted into, a discount you agreed to fund, a cancellation charged to you — comes off before this line, so read the rate card in your own agreement.
Commission on the pre-tax value
Check which base your agreement names. If it says the commission is a percentage of the food value before tax, a statement that takes it from the tax-inclusive ₹1,050 instead charges ₹262.50 of commission and ₹47.25 of GST on it — ₹14.75 more on this one order. Over a few hundred orders a month, it is worth checking.
Who pays which GST
Since 1 January 2022, when food is ordered through an e-commerce operator such as Swiggy or Zomato, the platform pays the GST on it, as if it were the supplier — section 9(5) of the CGST Act, brought in for restaurant services by Notification 17/2021-Central Tax (Rate). The platform issues the invoice to the customer, and it no longer collects TCS from the restaurant on those orders (CBIC Circular 167/23/2021-GST).
- The restaurant does not charge or pay GST on app orders, but it still reports them in its own returns — GSTR-1 Table 8 and GSTR-3B Table 3.1(c) — and they count in its aggregate turnover.
- A restaurant in “specified premises” — broadly, inside a hotel that charged more than ₹7,500 for a unit of accommodation in the previous financial year, or one that opted in — is outside this rule and pays the GST on its app orders itself.
- The commission is a service the platform supplies to you, with GST on its own tax invoice. The 5% rate for restaurants comes with a condition that input tax credit is not taken, so a restaurant on 5% cannot claim that GST back — it is a cost. This guide assumes 18%; use the rate printed on your platform’s invoice.
- Registration. Selling through a platform does not by itself make GST registration compulsory for a restaurant — section 24(ix) of the CGST Act leaves out supplies taxed under section 9(5) — but the ordinary threshold of ₹20 lakh of aggregate turnover (₹10 lakh in a few special category states) still applies, and app sales count towards it.
The details are in our GST guide for hotels and restaurants.
The income-tax deduction
Under the Income-tax Act, 2025 — in force from 1 April 2026, replacing the 1961 Act — an e-commerce operator deducts income tax at 0.1% of the gross amount of each sale it facilitates, with no minimum (section 393(1), Table serial 8(v); it was section 194-O before). It is not a cost: the amount is credited against your own income tax, so check that it appears in your annual tax statement on the income-tax portal. An individual or HUF seller whose gross sales through the platform are up to ₹5 lakh in the tax year, and who has given the platform a PAN or Aadhaar, is exempt.
The menu markup that keeps your margin
If a dish should leave you the same money from an app order as from the counter, the app price has to cover the commission and the GST on it. With a commission rate c and GST of 18% on the commission, the app price is the counter price ÷ (1 − c × 1.18):
| Commission | App price needed for every ₹100 at the counter | A ₹300 dish becomes |
|---|---|---|
| 15% | ₹121.51 (+21.5%) | ₹364.52 |
| 20% | ₹130.89 (+30.9%) | ₹392.67 |
| 25% | ₹141.84 (+41.8%) | ₹425.53 |
| 30% | ₹154.80 (+54.8%) | ₹464.40 |
Two cautions. First, this assumes the GST on the commission is a cost you cannot claim back, which is the case for a restaurant on the 5% rate; a hotel restaurant on 18% with input tax credit works it out without the 1.18. Second, check your agreement for any condition about the prices you list on the platform before you change them.
Which dishes lose money on the apps
The same commission hurts some dishes more than others, because it is taken from the price while the food cost stays the same. Listed at the counter price, with 25% commission, 18% GST on it and ₹15 of packaging per dish (all example figures):
| Dish | Price | Food cost | Left at the counter | Left on the app | Share kept |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dal makhani | ₹280 | ₹70 | ₹210 | ₹112.40 | 53.5% |
| Paneer tikka | ₹360 | ₹140 | ₹220 | ₹98.80 | 44.9% |
| Veg biryani | ₹240 | ₹85 | ₹155 | ₹69.20 | 44.6% |
Veg biryani keeps only 44.6% of what it leaves at the counter, dal makhani 53.5%. The dishes that suffer most are the ones whose counter margin is thin for their price, and the cheap ones, where the same packaging is a bigger share. Work this out for your own menu before deciding which dishes to list, and at what price.
Checking the payout
- Keep your own list of every app order: order number, date, food value, any discount you funded.
- Download the platform’s payout statement and its order-level annexure.
- Match them order by order. Every delivered order should be paid; check how cancelled and refunded orders were treated against your agreement.
- Recalculate the commission on the base your agreement names, and the GST on it at the rate on the platform’s invoice.
- Check every other deduction line against what you agreed to — advertising, collection charges, penalties.
- Check the tax deducted appears in your annual tax statement on the income-tax portal.
- Match the bank credit to the statement’s net payout, and raise any mismatch within the time your agreement allows.
To try the sums for your own menu, use the free delivery commission calculator.
In your own books
- An app order is a sale on the day it is placed, and the money arrives later as a payout — never as cash in the drawer.
- Book the commission, and the GST on it, as a cost on the day of the order, so the day’s figures show what the order really earned.
- Keep a payout register: each weekly transfer against the orders it pays for.
- Put app orders in the same kitchen queue as the dining room, so nothing is cooked from a second list — our KOT guide explains why.