Why Delivery Platforms Should Reimagine Annual Tax Filing for Earners
- Pritish Sahoo
- 12 hours ago
- 7 min read
Delivery and gig platforms have created a flexible, high-volume earning model, making gig workers one of the fastest growing workforces in the country. The number of gig workers is expected to expand from 7.7 million in 2020-21 to over 23.5 million by 2029-30 as per a NITI Aayog report.
For delivery platforms such as Zepto, Swiggy, Delhivery, and Zomato, these rising numbers present a huge opportunity for embedded finance to reduce high attrition rates and gain competitive advantage. One challenge for most delivery partners is a lack of tax awareness. A survey conducted across 40 cities in India found that 61% of them aren’t aware of income tax brackets, and only 33.5% of workers file their taxes annually.
This raises a crucial question. How can the annual filing process be made accurate, simple, and scalable for these earners? With income being spread across different months, multiple platforms, and even varying payout cycles, gig workers are often unable to track their refunds, deductions or even TDS accurately. Consequently, many earners either do not file and thus lose out on TDS refunds or file returns without fully reconciling their income.
This is where a gig or delivery platform can step in to create platform loyalty by transforming
tax filing from a year-end burden into a guided workflow. Instead of expecting earners to collect data from multiple sources and decode tax rules on their own, platforms can guide them towards an annual filing experience that improves accuracy and strengthens trust.
Partnering with TaxBuddy helps gig platforms achieve this and more with a simplified tax-filing solution. Read on to know how.
Table of content
Why Delivery Platform Workers Struggle with Annual Filing
One of the critical reasons why filing taxes remains difficult for gig workers is the format of their income. In most cases, they earn through different ways: incentives, base payouts, surge-based earnings, and peak-hour bonuses. Since they rarely earn a fixed monthly income, estimating annual earnings is difficult.
Another issue is that most workers don’t rely on a single delivery platform to earn their income but two or more. For instance, a worker may deliver with Swiggy, while taking assignments from Zepto or Delhivery, too. In such cases, income is spread across multiple apps, making it difficult to consolidate and report accurately as a single income tax return.
With most earners relying on app screenshots and scattered payout summaries, verifying data across multiple sources becomes a real struggle. Even if they try to file their returns, gig workers are unsure of which ITR form to choose. All these issues ultimately result in no filing, incomplete submissions, delayed filing, or errors.
Since most of these earners are first-time annual filers, they are unaware of compliance obligations, consequences of incorrect reporting, or due dates for filing their returns. Since TDS is reported by gig platforms to the Income Tax Department, they may also be eligible for refunds but often end up leaving money unclaimed.
Challenges Faced by Delivery Platforms
Delivery platforms face significant operational challenges when it comes to retaining gig workers and earning both loyalty and trust. During tax season, gig platforms see predictable spikes in queries, as earners seek consolidated statements, filing guidance, and TDS clarifications. Lack of clarity and friction in payouts have a direct impact on trust, leading gig workers to disengage with the platform. In such a case, workers may switch platforms and choose competitors offering better financial support tools. As a result, the platform loses engaged, high-value workers.
Delivery and gig platforms have their own technical and integration challenges too, which prevent them from providing an annual filing feature to their workers. The majority of platforms lack in-house expertise to build and maintain efficient tax engines that can help earners choose the right ITR form or file their returns seamlessly.
The ideal solution is to either build a tax infrastructure internally or partner with a certified provider like TaxBuddy. By offering this feature, delivery platforms are not merely solving a problem for workers. They are building a scalable and accurate compliance system that creates a unique business proposition.
How TaxBuddy’s Embedded Tax-filing Solution Addresses the Problem
As an e-Return Intermediary (ERI) registered with the Income Tax Department, TaxBuddy allows delivery platforms to empower gig workers with simplified access to tax-filing support. It works like this: delivery platforms add the tax-filing feature on their app’s banner and one click leads the workers to TaxBuddy’s WhatsApp bot. The gig worker finishes the entire annual filing journey on their phone. From uploading documents to filling forms, TaxBuddy enables a guided workflow while handling backend compliance efficiently.
Gig workers can choose from two modules: Tax Planner and ITR Filing. The tax planner module helps workers plan better to reduce tax liability and boost savings all across the year.
The ITR filing module helps workers file their returns without delay. All they have to do is provide PAN details and upload documents, such as Form 16, TDS, AIS, and other relevant details. The module auto-imports data and fills in the required information, reducing manual entry and the risk of errors.
Depending on the level of support that gig workers require, they can choose from Assisted or DIY filing. In the DIY option, users get a guided filing flow that helps them complete their tax returns easily. When a user chooses the assisted filing option, they receive support from TaxBuddy’s team of expert tax professionals. This is an added benefit for delivery platform partners who are unsure of how to file their returns.
That’s not all. TaxBuddy also provides notice support for 365 days for that financial year. This means that if a partner receives any notice from the Income Tax Department, TaxBuddy will help them resolve the issue from their end. This adds an extra layer of confidence to users as they complete the annual filing process.
To ensure data security, TaxBuddy’s information security system has been certified ISO/IEC 27001 by TÜV SÜD. In addition, it employs end-to-end encryption, robust access controls, real-time authentication validation, and secure compute environments. Its infrastructure is PCI-aware, audit-ready, and designed for BFSI-grade compliance.
How Delivery Platforms Can Benefit
In today’s competitive landscape where retention, transparency, and service quality matter more each year, automated annual filing can help delivery platforms create measurable value for both workers and the business.
Boost retention and reduce churn
Gig platforms that simplify tax-filing are better placed to earn loyalty and engagement from workers who are otherwise known to have a high turnover.
Differentiate from competitors
Offering embedded tax tools turns the delivery portal from employer to financial partner, creating a sticky ecosystem that helps build loyalty.
Reduce seasonal support costs
Instead of HR teams getting inundated by TDS queries and tax-related requests, delivery portals can offload all such tasks to TaxBuddy.
Build trust and brand equity
Workers who file accurately and claim refunds are more likely to associate the gig portal with financial wellness.
Future-proof against IT regulations
As gig worker classification and tax scrutiny intensify, platforms with embedded tax compliance infrastructure are better placed to stay ahead of mandates.
Remain scalable
TaxBuddy’s tax-filing solution is designed to handle increasing workloads without compromising performance or compliance. This is a key benefit for large delivery and gig ecosystems, where millions of earners may need filing support at the same time.
Conclusion
Annual filing is no longer a peripheral concern for delivery platforms — it directly impacts worker retention, operational efficiency, and competitive positioning. As gig workers continue to grow into the millions and regulatory expectations around income transparency tighten, platforms that embed automated filing solutions are better poised to stay ahead of the game.
Platforms like Delhivery, Zomato, Swiggy, Zepto, Flipkart, Swish, Grab, Snabbit, bigbasket, YesMadam, KarmaLifeAI, Pronto, and Nia.one have already benefited from TaxBuddy’s tax-filing solutions. Our ERI-certified infrastructure, WhatsApp-first workflow, and 365-day notice support don’t require platforms to build tax expertise in-house while helping platforms drive long-term profitability. Request a demo with TaxBuddy to see how we can help you turn tax-filing into an advantage.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. How does TaxBuddy integrate with existing delivery platforms?
Rather than integration, TaxBuddy offers simplified embedded ITR filing services to delivery platforms. All they do is add a tax-filing banner linked to TaxBuddy and one click takes workers to a WhatsApp bot that guides them to complete their tax-filing journey.
2. What makes it difficult for delivery platform earners to handle traditional tax filing methods?
Partners often earn through irregular payouts, multiple incentives, and use more than one platform to source their income. Their earnings are usually not documented in a single, structured format, which makes manual filing more time-consuming and error prone.
3. What security measures have TaxBuddy put in place to protect sensitive user data?
Since security is paramount and TaxBuddy adheres to ISO/IEC 27001 standards, employing end-to-end encryption, robust access controls, and comprehensive audit trails to protect PAN, Aadhaar, bank, and income data.
4. How does the tax-filing solution of TaxBuddy cater to workers with varying levels of tax complexity?
TaxBuddy’s two-tiered filing approach is designed for all user segments. For simple cases, the DIY mode offers one-click filing with auto-populated forms and AI assistance. The expert-assisted mode connects workers with certified tax professionals who can support workers with complex queries.
5. Who is responsible for regulatory compliance and tax law updates?
TaxBuddy is a registered e-filing intermediary with the IT Department and manages all tax logic and regulatory updates through its centralised compliance engine. This offloads the responsibility from platforms and ensures filings adhere to the latest government norms. In other words, delivery platforms needn’t maintain tax slabs or update regulations from their end, as the entire process is managed by TaxBuddy.
6. What support is provided by TaxBuddy during and after integration?
Gig platforms can drive awareness with TaxBuddy’s marketing and promotional support. Our team creates reels, social media creatives and WhatsApp communication copy – all of which are designed using the partner’s brand elements, design language, and colour palette. This allows partners to run marketing campaigns without taking on additional content or design pressure. In addition, TaxBuddy offers ITR filing reminder campaigns and other educational content to boost adoption and bridge knowledge gaps.
