GST invoicing for studios in India: the rules and the software

The Scheme of Classification of Services lists Group 99972, “Beauty and physical well-being services”, with SAC 999723, “Physical well-being services including health club and fitness centre”.¹

The GST Council’s FAQ on the 56th meeting’s decisions: “Beauty and physical well-being services including services of health clubs, salons, barbers, fitness centers, yoga, etc. will attract GST rate of 5% without ITC.” Earlier: 18%.²

Notification 15/2025-Central Tax (Rate), 17 September 2025, from 22 September 2025: heading 9997, “Beauty and physical well-being services falling under Group 99972”, has a central tax entry of 2.5, provided input tax credit has not been taken.³

The 5% rate comes with a condition: the notification applies it where input tax credit hasn’t been taken. Ask your chartered accountant how that applies to your studio before you change your rates.^2,3

CGST Rules, rule 46: a tax invoice must show the supplier’s name, address and GSTIN; a consecutive serial number of up to 16 characters, unique for a financial year; the date; and the recipient’s GSTIN if registered.⁴

For an unregistered recipient, rule 46 requires the name, address, delivery address and State name and code where the taxable value is ₹50,000 or more, or below that if the recipient asks for them.⁴

Rule 46 also requires the HSN code, the taxable value, the rate and amount of central, State, integrated or Union territory tax, and, for an inter-State supply, the place of supply with the State’s name.⁴

Notification 78/2020-Central Tax (15 October 2020, from 1 April 2021): 4 HSN digits up to ₹5 crore turnover, 6 above; up to ₹5 crore, invoices to unregistered persons may omit them.⁵

A proviso to rule 46 lets a registered person skip a tax invoice when the recipient is unregistered and doesn’t require one, and instead issue a consolidated tax invoice at the close of each day.⁴

Rule 48: a services invoice is prepared in duplicate, the original for the recipient and the duplicate for the supplier, and invoice serial numbers for each tax period are furnished in FORM GSTR-1.⁶

Central GST is levied on intra-State supplies (CGST Act, section 9(1)); integrated GST is levied on inter-State supplies (IGST Act, section 5(1)).^7,8

IGST Act: a supply of services is intra-State where the supplier’s location and the place of supply are in the same State or Union territory (section 8(2)), and inter-State where they are in different ones (section 7(3)).^9,10

IGST Act, section 12(4): “The place of supply of restaurant and catering services, personal grooming, fitness, beauty treatment, health service including cosmetic and plastic surgery shall be the location where the services are actually performed.”¹¹

So for a class taught at your studio, the place of supply is where the class takes place. When that’s in the State where you’re registered, the supply is intra-State, and CGST and SGST apply. Ask your chartered accountant about online classes and sessions in other States.^7,8,9,10,11

CGST Act, section 22(1): a supplier must register in a State or Union territory, other than special category States, if aggregate turnover in a financial year exceeds twenty lakh rupees; ten lakh rupees in special category States.¹²

Section 22 defines “special category States” by article 279A(4)(g) of the Constitution, excluding Jammu and Kashmir, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Sikkim and Uttarakhand. A proviso permits up to forty lakh rupees only for goods-only suppliers.¹²

Notification 10/2023-Central Tax (10 May 2023) lowered the e-invoicing turnover threshold from ten crore rupees to five crore rupees from 1 August 2023; the e-invoice portal lists it as its latest notification.^13,14

Rule 48(4): notified registered persons prepare invoices after obtaining an Invoice Reference Number from the common GST portal; rule 46(r) then requires a QR code with the IRN embedded.^4,6

Among the products we checked, Zenoti, DINGG, Okfit and Centrl Studio describe GST invoices with the CGST and SGST split, and DINGG describes GST summaries for GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B. The international platforms describe a tax ID and named tax rates rather than GST fields, and several Indian tools don’t mention GST on the pages we checked.^{15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36}

StudioFly’s GST invoices carry CGST and SGST, or IGST, with SAC codes, and it exports GSTR-1 data. Studios that aren’t GST-registered can issue simple invoices without tax.