Notification No. 11/2017-Central Tax (Rate)

What it does

Notification No. 11/2017-Central Tax (Rate), published as G.S.R. 690(E) and dated 28 June 2017, is the rate card for services under the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017. It is a table. Each serial number names a category of service, each row gives the rate of central tax, and a further column attaches conditions to the rate. The rate on any supply of a service is found by locating the entry that describes it and reading the condition beside it.

It is a notification, not an Act, and it is made by the Central Government on the recommendation of the Goods and Services Tax Council. It is the central tax half of a pair. The Integrated Goods and Services Tax Act has a matching notification for the integrated tax rate, and the two are amended in step, so a rate change is read in both.

Who it binds

Every registered person who supplies a service listed in the table, and through them the recipient who bears the tax. The notification does not decide whether a supply is taxable at all; the Act does that. What the notification decides is the rate and the conditions on which that rate may be charged. A condition in the last column is part of the entry, so a supplier that does not meet it cannot use the rate.

What has changed, and when

The table has been amended repeatedly by later notifications, and each amendment operates from a stated date. The site's note on hotel rooms records the amendments that matter to accommodation, which sits at serial number 7 of the table.

Notification No. 20/2019-Central Tax (Rate) of 30 September 2019 reworded item (i) to describe hotel accommodation above INR 1,000 and up to INR 7,500 per unit per day. Notification No. 03/2022-Central Tax (Rate) removed the lower floor from 18 July 2022, so the entry has since covered every room up to INR 7,500. Notification No. 05/2025-Central Tax (Rate) of 16 January 2025 replaced the definition of declared tariff with a definition of specified premises from 1 April 2025, which decides the rate on a hotel's restaurant service and outdoor catering.

Notification No. 15/2025-Central Tax (Rate) of 17 September 2025 changed item (i) with effect from 22 September 2025. The central tax rate became 2.5 per cent, against 6 per cent before, which is 5 per cent once the matching state or integrated tax is added. The entry now carries a condition that credit of input tax on the goods and services used in supplying the service has not been taken.

What turns on it in practice

The recurring point is that a rate in this table can be tied to a condition that the supplier controls, and the condition is not optional. For hotel rooms up to INR 7,500 a day, the entry applies only where no input tax credit is taken. The residual entry for accommodation, food and beverage services carries an Explanation that the items listed against it attract the rate prescribed in their own entry and not the residual rate, so a hotel cannot keep its credit by charging the higher rate. The choice is made for the hotel by the notification.

The second point is dating. A supply on 21 September 2025 and one on 22 September 2025 fall under different versions of the same entry, with different rates and different credit consequences. An invoice, a contract price and a dispute with the department each turn on the version of the entry in force on the date of supply.

For the taxation and fiscal practice, the work is reading the entry as it stood on the relevant date, together with the conditions beside it, and not the rate as remembered. The site's note on hotel rooms is the model: it follows one entry through four notifications to show what it says today.