e-Way Bill under GST (India, FY 2026-27)

1. What an e-Way bill is

An e-Way bill is an electronic document, generated on the GST e-Way bill portal (ewaybillgst.gov.in), that must accompany the movement of goods worth more than ₹50,000. It is governed by Rule 138 of the CGST Rules, 2017, read with Section 68 of the CGST Act.

e-Way bills sit inside the broader GST compliance stack — for the place-of-supply rules, returns and ITC framework that determine the invoice underlying the movement, see our GST guide.

Why it exists

Pre-GST, every state had its own way-bill system — Form 38 in UP, Sugam in Karnataka, Form 50 in West Bengal, and so on. Movement across state borders meant fresh paperwork at every check-post. The e-Way bill replaced 17 different state-level systems with a single nationwide electronic format, effective 1 April 2018 for inter-state and rolled out progressively for intra-state thereafter.

What it covers

• Movement under a tax invoice (sale)
• Movement under a bill of supply (exempt / composition)
• Movement under a delivery challan (job-work, branch transfer, exhibition, return goods, line sale)
• Movement of goods over ₹50,000 even if you are unregistered (limited use cases)

2. When an e-Way bill is required

The trigger is the consignment value — invoice value + GST + cess. Mandatory in the following circumstances:

• Inter-state movement of goods worth over ₹50,000 — universally applicable across India.
• Intra-state movement over the state-specific threshold (see §3).
• Goods sent for job-work — even though not a sale.
• Return of goods, expired stock, exhibition / line-sale stock movement.
• Movement by an unregistered person supplying to a registered recipient — the recipient typically generates the bill.
• Importsafter customs clearance — generated for movement from port to importer's premises.
• Exports — generated for movement to the port, on the basis of the export invoice.

The 180-day rule on the base document

With effect from 1 January 2025, an e-Way bill cannot be generated against a base document (invoice, bill of supply or delivery challan) older than 180 days. The portal rejects any attempt to raise a bill where the document date is more than 180 days before the generation date. The practical consequence: stale or back-dated paperwork can no longer carry a fresh movement — the document and the dispatch have to stay within the 180-day window. Verify against the current NIC advisory, as the window has been tightened in stages.

3. State-wise intra-state thresholds — what is the limit in my state?

Inter-state is uniformly ₹50,000. Intra-state thresholds vary. Most states use ₹1 lakh; some retain ₹50,000; selected states / commodities have their own carve-outs. Always confirm against the latest state notification before configuring billing software.

Many states allow intra-city movement within a 50-km radius between the consignor and a transporter's premises with Part-B optional. The 50-km exception is the most-used field carve-out for short-haul aggregation.

4. Who can generate the e-Way bill

Three parties have the right to generate:

• Supplier (consignor) — registered or unregistered. If unregistered, the supplier must enrol on the e-Way bill portal as a transporter / supplier and obtain a 15-digit enrolment ID.
• Recipient (consignee)— typical when the supplier is unregistered or doesn't have e-Way bill access.
• Transporter — books the consignment and generates on behalf of the consignor / consignee. The transporter ID is assigned in Part-A.

Only one e-Way bill exists per consignment — duplicate generation is blocked by the invoice-number hash. Once generated, the other parties can update Part-B but not create a new bill.

Two-factor authentication on login

The e-Way bill and e-Invoice portals have moved to two-factor authentication (2FA) — login now requires the password plus a one-time OTP delivered via SMS, the NIC-GST-Shield app or email. The rollout has been phased by turnover band and is now broadly mandatory. If you generate bills through an API or a GSP, make sure your integration is enrolled for 2FA so the auth token keeps issuing — an un-enrolled login will be blocked.

5. Part A and Part B — the data fields

Part A — Invoice data

• GSTIN of supplier and recipient (or enrolment ID for unregistered)
• Place of dispatch — state and PIN code
• Place of delivery — state and PIN code
• Document type — Invoice / Bill of Supply / Delivery Challan / Bill of Entry / Other
• Document number and date
• HSN code of the principal item (at 4 / 6 / 8-digit per turnover slab)
• Reason for transport — Supply / Job Work / Sales Return / Exhibition / Line Sale / etc.
• Transport document number — LR / RR / Airway bill
• Total invoice value and tax break-up

Part B — Vehicle and transport data

• Mode of transport — Road / Rail / Air / Ship
• Vehicle registration number — required for road
• Transporter GSTIN / enrolment ID
• Date and time of transport start

A bill with Part-A only (no Part-B) is incomplete — goods cannot move. Common pattern: supplier raises Part-A, transporter slots in Part-B when picking up the consignment. Validity clock starts only when Part-B is populated.

6. Validity — 1 day per 200 km

Validity depends on distance and cargo type. The portal auto-calculates based on the PIN-to-PIN distance computed via map APIs at the time of generation.

How the day is counted

“Day” is a calendar day from midnight to midnight. A bill generated at 8 PM with 1-day validity expires at midnight the next day — about 28 effective hours. Plan accordingly: generating Part-B on Friday evening for a Monday-morning delivery doesn't leave much margin.

Distance examples

• Mumbai → Pune (~150 km): 1 day
• Mumbai → Delhi (~1,400 km): 7 days
• Mumbai → Kolkata (~1,950 km): 10 days
• Mumbai → Guwahati (~2,950 km): 15 days

7. Extension — how to extend an e-Way bill (the 8-hour window)?

An e-Way bill can be extended within an 8-hour window before or after expiry. Beyond the 16-hour total window, the bill is dead and a fresh one must be generated (if the consignment is still moving on the same invoice).

Reasons accepted for extension

• Natural calamity
• Law-and-order situation
• Transhipment
• Accident
• Vehicle breakdown
• Other (specify) — used for traffic block, delay at consignee's end, etc.

Who can extend

The transporter is the default extender — they are closest to the consignment in motion. The consignor or consignee can also extend if the transporter hasn't. Each extension adds the remaining distance × 1 day per 200 km.

8. Multiple modes of transport — updates needed

Real consignments often change mode — road to rail to road, road to ship, etc. Each mode change requires a Part-B update on the e-Way bill portal:

• Vehicle change: if the same mode (road) continues with a different vehicle (breakdown, transhipment), update Part-B with the new vehicle number.
• Mode change: from road to rail, update the mode and add the RR number. The vehicle field can be blank while the goods are on rail.
• Transporter change: the original transporter assigns the consignment to a new transporter on the portal — the new transporter then updates Part-B of the running bill.

All updates leave a chronological audit trail in the bill's history. If pulled over for verification, the officer sees the full chain of vehicle / mode changes.

9. Auto-generation from e-Invoice IRN

Taxpayers covered by the e-Invoice mandate (AATO over ₹5 crore) can generate the e-Way bill simultaneously with the IRN. The IRP API accepts an optional EwbDtls block in the INV-01 payload — populate it, and the IRP pushes the data to the e-Way bill portal, returning both the IRN and the EWB number in one response.

What auto-flows

• Part-A — all invoice details from the IRN payload
• Distance — computed from supplier and recipient pincodes
• Validity — auto-set per distance / cargo type

What you still add manually

• Part-B — vehicle number and mode
• Transporter ID — if different from supplier / recipient

This is the cleanest workflow for high-volume sellers — one API call, two compliances. Both auto-cancel together if you cancel the IRN within 24 hours.

10. Cancellation and rejection — how to cancel an e-Way bill?

Cancellation by the generator

The generator (supplier / recipient / transporter) can cancel an e-Way bill within 24 hours of generation. After 24 hours, cancellation is not allowed — the bill stays on record. Cancel only if the consignment is not moving — once the goods are en route, do not cancel.

Rejection by the recipient

The recipient can reject an e-Way bill within 72 hours of generation, or before delivery, whichever is earlier. Use rejection when the consignment was never received, invoice details are wrong, or the goods are not yours. Rejection nullifies the bill — the supplier has to reissue corrected paperwork.

Cancellation v. Rejection

Cancellation is supplier-driven (the supplier decides not to move). Rejection is recipient-driven (the recipient says “not mine”). Both achieve the same outcome — the bill is invalid — but the audit trail differs.

11. Exemptions — when is no e-Way bill needed?

Rule 138(14) lists exempt scenarios. No e-Way bill is required for:

• Movement of specified goods in the Annexure — live animals, fresh fruit and vegetables, milk, eggs, books, newspapers, paper money, defence goods, specified jewellery, used personal effects under ₹50 lakh, kerosene oil sold under PDS, postal baggage, currency, etc.
• Goods transported by a non-motorised conveyance — hand cart, animal-drawn cart, bicycle
• Movement from port / airport / land customs station to an inland container depot or container freight station for clearance by customs
• Movement of empty cargo containers
• Movement of goods within a notified area (state-specific)
• Movement within 50 km within the state between consignor and transporter — Part-B is optional (Part-A still required)
• Goods transported by Ministry of Defence as consignor / consignee
• Goods exempt from GST (specified by HSN in state notifications)

12. Penalties under Section 129 — what if goods move without an e-Way bill?

Section 129 read with Rule 138 empowers the officer to detain the vehicle and the goods if an e-Way bill is missing, expired or materially wrong. The penalty regime is steep — designed to deter, not just to recover tax.

Where the owner comes forward

• Taxable goods: 200% of tax, paid by the owner. Goods released on payment.
• Exempt goods: 2% of the value of goods or ₹25,000, whichever is lower.

Where the owner does not come forward

• Taxable goods: 50% of the value of goods, plus tax. Effectively 100% of the value where GST is around 18%.
• Exempt goods: 5% of the value or ₹25,000, whichever is lower.

Confiscation under Section 130

Repeat offence or evident intent to evade attracts confiscation of the goods and the conveyance. The taxpayer must pay a fine in lieu of confiscation — up to the market value of the goods.

How to respond to detention

1. Form GST MOV-01 — order of detention served on the driver / transporter.
2. Form GST MOV-02 — statement of facts; the taxpayer / driver responds.
3. Form GST MOV-06 — order of demand of tax and penalty.
4. Form GST MOV-07 — release of goods on payment.
5. Appeal lies under Section 107 to the appellate authority with 25% pre-deposit of the disputed amount.

13. Bill-to / Ship-to scenarios

A common B2B pattern: supplier A bills to buyer B but ships directly to B's customer C. There is one movement (A → C) but two invoices (A → B, B → C).

How to fill the e-Way bill

• Consignor: A (the actual dispatching location)
• Consignee: C (the actual receiving location)
• Bill From: A
• Bill To: B
• Ship From:A's premises
• Ship To:C's premises

Who generates

Practically, A generates one e-Way bill for the A → C movement. If B is also required to generate (because the B → C invoice is over the threshold), B generates a second bill on the same movement. The portal accepts both — the goods carry both bills.

Place of supply under Section 10(1)(b) — the “third-party doctrine” — is the bill-to state (B's state), not the ship-to state. This decides whether A charges CGST+SGST or IGST.

14. Job-work consignments

Goods sent for job work move on a delivery challan (Rule 55), not a tax invoice — because there is no sale. An e-Way bill is required if the consignment crosses the threshold.

The flow

1. Principal → job worker — principal generates the e-Way bill using a delivery challan as the document.
2. Job worker → principal (return of processed goods) — job worker generates the e-Way bill using their own delivery challan.
3. Job worker → buyer(direct dispatch from job-worker premises, on principal's instruction) — principal generates the e-Way bill; job-worker premises is the dispatch location.

ITC-04 reconciliation

Job-work movements are separately reported in Form ITC-04 on a half-yearly basis (turnover above ₹5 crore — September and March; turnover up to ₹5 crore — annually). ITC-04 reconciles goods sent vs goods received back vs goods sold from job-worker premises.

15. RFID and the new vehicle-tracking layer

From 2021 onwards, transporters with vehicles enrolled on the VAHAN database can link the vehicle's FASTag RFID to the e-Way bill. Toll plazas across India report tag scans in real time — the e-Way bill portal tracks vehicle progress automatically.

What this enables

• Real-time location of vehicles carrying high-value or risk-flagged consignments
• Automatic mismatch alerts — if a vehicle's tag is seen on a route that doesn't match the e-Way bill, enforcement teams are flagged
• Eased verification — officers can confirm vehicle has been moving as declared without physically inspecting

What it means for compliance

Vehicle / mode changes must be updated promptly in Part-B — the RFID scans will inevitably surface a mismatch later if you transfer to a different vehicle without updating. Notified commodities (sensitive goods like pan masala, tobacco) and certain routes now require RFID-tagged vehicles.

16. Common mistakes that lead to detention

• Expired e-Way bill. Vehicle stuck in traffic, delivery delayed — bill expires en route. Extend within the 8-hour window or risk detention.
• Vehicle number mismatch.The vehicle in Part-B doesn't match the vehicle at the check-post — flagged immediately. Update Part-B at every vehicle change.
• Wrong place of dispatch / delivery. Pin codes pulled from the supplier master without checking the actual dispatch location — common when shipping from a secondary godown.
• Missing Part-B. Common in road transhipment — supplier raised Part-A and assumed transporter would fill Part-B; transporter assumed supplier did. Goods leave with Part-B blank.
• Wrong HSN code triggering rate mismatch. Same as e-Invoice — incorrect HSN can trigger sanity checks at verification.
• Forgetting to cancel a stale bill. Order cancelled, but the e-Way bill stays open. If the same vehicle is later checked for an unrelated consignment, the open bill can cause confusion.
• Treating delivery challans as exempt. Job-work, branch transfer and return movements need an e-Way bill if value crosses threshold — even though they are not sales.
• Confusing the inter-state threshold with the intra-state threshold. ₹50,000 always for inter-state, but most states use ₹1 lakh for intra-state. Configure your billing software per state.
• Driver carrying only the EWB number. The bill should be available — printed, on a phone screen, or quickly fetched online. Pulling it up under traffic pressure costs time at a check-post.

17. Frequently asked questions

18. e-Way bill glossary

EWB

e-Way Bill — 12-digit electronic document accompanying movement of goods.

EWB-01

Individual e-Way bill form — one per consignment.

EWB-02

Consolidated e-Way bill — one truck carrying multiple individual bills.

EWB-03 / 04

Verification record / detention complaint forms.

Part A

Invoice and consignment details — GSTIN, place, HSN, value, reason for transport.

Part B

Vehicle and mode details — vehicle number, mode, transporter ID.

Consignor

The party sending the goods — usually the supplier.

Consignee

The party receiving the goods — usually the recipient / buyer.

Transporter ID

15-digit ID for a registered or enrolled transporter.

ODC

Over-Dimensional Cargo — validity at 1 day per 20 km instead of 200 km.

Delivery Challan

Rule 55 document for movement without sale — job work, branch transfer, return.

MOV-01 to 07

Detention / release order forms under Section 129.

Section 129

Detention and penalty for missing / wrong e-Way bill.

Section 130

Confiscation for repeat offence or intent to evade.

Rule 138

CGST Rule prescribing the e-Way bill regime.

RFID

Radio Frequency ID — vehicle FASTag tag linked to the e-Way bill.

VAHAN

Government vehicle-registration database — source of RFID linkage.

Pin-to-Pin distance

Distance auto-computed by the portal between dispatch and delivery PIN codes.