Service Exports from India Scheme (SEIS): What It Was, and Whether You Can Still Claim It

The Service Exports from India Scheme (SEIS) was a government incentive that rewarded Indian service exporters with transferable duty credit scrips worth 3% to 7% of their net foreign exchange earnings.

If you are researching it in 2026, the single most important fact is this: it is no longer available.

SEIS applied only up to the financial year 2019-20. No benefit accrues for services rendered on or after 1 April 2020, and the scheme has not been replaced.

Three points settle most of the questions people arrive with:

• SEIS is discontinued for services rendered on or after 1 April 2020.
• RoDTEP did not replace it. RoDTEP, which replaced the goods-side MEIS, covers merchandise only, not services.
• The claim window has closed. Applications for the last eligible year, FY 2019-20, shut on 28 February 2022.

If your business runs on cross-border payments for service exporters, this guide explains what SEIS was, why it ended, and, more usefully, the support that service exporters can actually still use today.

SEIS sat in Chapter 3 of the Foreign Trade Policy 2015-20 and was administered by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT). It was designed to make Indian services more competitive abroad by rewarding foreign-exchange earnings.

The reward came as a Duty Credit Scrip, a transferable instrument you could use to pay basic customs duty, or sell to another importer for cash.

The scrip was worth a set percentage of your Net Foreign Exchange (NFE), which is your foreign-exchange earnings minus your foreign-exchange spend.

Because the scrip was transferable, even a pure services firm with no import needs could monetise it.

This is what made SEIS attractive across the export of services vs export of goods divide: a software or consulting exporter that imported nothing could still turn the scrip into money.

While it ran, SEIS had a clear eligibility and reward structure. The essentials looked like this.

A worked example, historical. A consulting firm earning US$500,000 of net foreign exchange in a notified 5% category would have earned a scrip worth US$25,000. It could use that against customs duty or sell it.

That is the scale of benefit exporters remember, and why the scheme is still searched for years after it ended.

Note the rate and eligibility were set by service category and by the appendices, so not every service qualified, and not at the same rate.

The reward was a percentage of Net Foreign Exchange, not of gross billings, so the calculation mattered. NFE was your foreign-exchange earnings from eligible services in the year, minus the foreign-exchange you spent on services in the same year.

A negative or nil NFE meant no entitlement, even if your gross exports were large. A firm that billed heavily abroad but also paid large foreign-currency costs could find its rewardable base far smaller than its top line suggested.

This is why exporters tracked their inward and outward foreign-currency flows carefully. The same discipline still helps today, because your realised foreign-exchange earnings drive both your GST refund and your bank realisation record.

Understanding the old process explains why the closed window is final. A claim was not automatic; it was an application to the DGFT with supporting evidence.

The broad steps were:

• Hold an active IEC for the period the services were rendered.
• Compile proof of foreign-exchange earnings, typically bank realisation evidence and a chartered accountant certificate of NFE.
• File the online application to the DGFT for the relevant financial year, within that year's window.
• Receive the Duty Credit Scrip, then use it against customs duty or transfer it.

Each year had its own application window. Once a year's window closed, that year could no longer be claimed, which is exactly what happened to FY 2019-20 after 28 February 2022.

The government discontinued SEIS for services rendered on or after 1 April 2020. FY 2019-20 was the last eligible year, and even that year was capped, at ₹5 crore per IEC, under a 2021 notification.

The claim window for that final year closed on 28 February 2022, with no late-cut facility afterwards. The DGFT subsequently confirmed, in early 2023, that SEIS benefits had stopped from 1 April 2020.

Here is the point most stale articles miss. On the goods side, MEIS was replaced by RoDTEP. On the services side, there was no equivalent successor.

As of August 2026, RoDTEP remains goods-only, and no direct duty-remission or scrip scheme exists for service exports.

The broad rationale was that India's services exports had grown strongly and were competing globally without a direct subsidy. Policy shifted toward tax neutrality, simpler compliance and faster settlement rather than cash-style scrips.

Whatever the reasoning, the effect for a service exporter today is the same: plan around the tools that remain, not a scheme that has ended.

The dates are what make the status unambiguous. This is the full arc.

The incentive is gone, but support for service exporters is not. The tools that remain are about tax neutrality and cheaper capital, rather than a cash scrip. These are the practical levers now.

Most services firms get the biggest, most reliable benefit from the GST route. Exporting under a Letter of Undertaking, and understanding LUT vs IGST refund, keeps your working capital free rather than locked in tax you later reclaim.

The mechanics of export of services under GST and the FIRC for GST refund trail matter far more to your cash position now than a discontinued scrip.

For location or capital-intensive setups, an EOU or the wider SEZ compliance framework can still carry benefits. And for working capital against your invoices, export finance companies fill part of the gap that a scrip used to.

It helps to translate the change into money. Say a services firm earns US$1,000,000 of net foreign exchange in a year.

Under SEIS, in a 5% category, that would have generated a scrip worth about US$50,000, usable against duty or sold for cash. That direct top-up is gone.

The value now has to come from levers you control rather than a government reward:

• Foreign-exchange cost: the gap between a bank's marked-up rate and the mid-market rate can run into several percent of every receipt. Narrowing it recovers real money on the same US$1,000,000.
• Refund speed: faster GST refunds and quicker realisation free up working capital that a slow trail ties down.
• Fewer failed or delayed receipts: clean documentation avoids the cost of chasing and re-doing.

None of these equals a 5% scrip on its own, and it would be wrong to pretend otherwise.

But together they target the same outcome, more cash retained per dollar earned, through routes that no longer depend on a scheme that has closed.

The practical shift is from claiming an incentive after the fact to designing your receiving and tax setup so less leaks out in the first place.

It helps to see SEIS in context. It was one of several DGFT schemes, and the landscape has shifted from cash-style rewards toward tax neutrality.

The broader export incentives picture, and initiatives under the government's export promotion mission, show the direction of travel: less reliance on scrips, more on zero-rating, simpler compliance and faster settlement.

For a services exporter, that means the returns you file, such as GSTR-1 for export of services, now do more for your bottom line than any incentive scheme.

• "SEIS is still open, the DGFT portal shows it." The portal still references the scheme and past-year modules, but no benefit accrues for services from 1 April 2020. Portal presence is not current availability.
• "RoDTEP is the new SEIS." It is not. RoDTEP covers goods only; there is no services equivalent as of 2026.
• "I can still claim for 2021-22 or 2022-23." No. FY 2019-20 was the last eligible year and its window closed on 28 February 2022.
• "A consultant can get me a scrip now." For post-March-2020 services there is nothing to file. Verify any such offer against the DGFT.
• "Service exporters get no support at all now." Not true. GST zero-rating, LUT, SEZ or EOU status and export finance remain available.

With no incentive scrip to chase, the controllable levers for a service exporter are your tax position and the cost and speed of getting paid. The second is often the larger, quieter drain.

Bringing your international receipts into dedicated receiving accounts settles them at a transparent rate, with the eFIRA issued automatically so your GST refund and bank realisation trail stay clean.

Saving on foreign-exchange cost and closing receipts faster puts real money back in the business. That is exactly what the old scrip used to do, only through a route you fully control.

Xflow holds final Payment Aggregator - Cross Border (PA-CB) authorisation from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for both exports and imports, as of February 2026, and settles inward receipts to your Indian bank account the next business day.

This guide is general information, not legal or tax advice. Scheme status and eligibility change, so confirm the current position with the DGFT and a qualified professional before acting.