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What a GST invoice for cloud hosting must contain

The fields an Indian GST tax invoice for cloud hosting must carry, why a payment receipt is not a substitute for it, and how to check the invoice you were sent.

A payment receipt and a tax invoice are different documents. Only one of them supports an input tax credit claim, and the difference is not cosmetic — it is a specific list of fields.

If you have ever had an expense queried at filing time, this is usually why. This page lists what the document has to carry. It is general information, not tax advice.

The required fields

A tax invoice with the fields that decide the credit called out: supplier GSTIN, your GSTIN, a gapless serial invoice number, place of supply, and tax shown as its own line.

A tax invoice for a service is required to show:

  • Supplier’s name, address and GSTIN.
  • A serial number, unique within the financial year and consecutive. Gaps and duplicates are both problems, which is why invoice numbers are issued in sequence rather than derived from something convenient like a payment reference.
  • Date of issue.
  • Recipient’s name, address and GSTIN, where the recipient is registered.
  • A description of the service, and its SAC code (cloud hosting is 998315).
  • Taxable value — the amount before tax.
  • Rate of tax, and the amount of tax, shown separately for CGST and SGST, or as IGST.
  • Place of supply, with the state, where the supply is inter-state.
  • Whether tax is payable on reverse charge.
  • Signature or digital signature of the supplier or an authorised person.

The two that get omitted most often on software-generated invoices are the SAC code and the place of supply. Both matter: the first classifies what was sold, the second determines whether the tax should have been split as CGST and SGST or charged as IGST.

Why a receipt is not enough

A payment confirmation typically shows a total, a date, and a transaction reference. What it does not show is the supplier’s GSTIN, the taxable value separated from the tax, the rate, or the place of supply.

Without those, there is no way to establish how much tax was charged on the supply, so there is nothing to claim. A card statement line is weaker still — it establishes only that money left your account.

How to check the invoice you were sent

Open the document and confirm, in order:

  1. Is there a GSTIN for the supplier? No GSTIN, no claim. If the supplier is outside India there will not be one — see Reverse charge on foreign cloud hosting.
  2. Is your GSTIN on it? If you are registered and it is missing, the invoice does not identify your business as the recipient. Fix your billing details before the next payment.
  3. Is the tax a separate line, not folded into a total? You need the taxable value and the tax amount as distinct figures.
  4. Is the split right for your state? Same state as the supplier means CGST plus SGST. Different state means IGST. A wrong split usually means a wrong address on file.
  5. Does the invoice number look like part of a series? A serial number, not a random reference.

If any of the first four fail, resolve it before you accumulate a year of the same problem.

The state field is the one to get right

Place of supply is derived from your registered state. If your billing address carries the wrong state, every invoice issued afterwards carries the wrong tax split — and correcting it later means the tax was charged under the wrong heads for that whole period, which is a genuine reconciliation problem rather than a cosmetic one.

Enter the address exactly as it appears on your GST registration certificate.

What Voroa issues

Voroa issues a GST tax invoice automatically for a payment that is invoiceable — a real charge for service, as opposed to a zero-value mandate-verification debit. Each carries the supplier name, address, GSTIN and state; a serial invoice number allocated in sequence for the financial year; SAC 998315; your GSTIN where you have entered one; the taxable value; the rate; the CGST and SGST or IGST amounts; the place of supply; and an authorised signature.

Each service you pay for is its own line, named so you can tell which one it is: the product, the name you gave the service, and the plan you are on – for example Managed PostgreSQL - orders-db (DB Basic). Purchased Postgres storage is a separate line from the instance it belongs to, because it is priced separately. Where a charge covers part of a month, the line states the dates it covers, and the lines always add up to the taxable value printed below them.

The rate and the supplier details are recorded as they were at the moment of issue, so a regenerated copy of an old invoice shows what was actually charged then rather than what is configured now.

Invoices are available in your workspace billing section and are emailed to you.

Last updated September 6, 2026