By Sahil Tomar · Updated August 27, 2026 · Reading time ~5 min
If you have ever tried to file a fuel expense reimbursement in India, you know the pain of a lost or faded thermal receipt. This guide breaks down exactly what an Indian petrol-pump receipt looks like, why it looks that way, how the formats differ across BP, IOCL, HP and Shell, and what GST and expense rules apply. Every field described maps directly to the editable fields in the petrol bill generator.
Almost every fuel outlet in India prints on 58 mm thermal paper using a Hengstler, Epson or Wep-branded direct-thermal printer bolted to the dispenser controller. The paper is heat-sensitive — no ink, no ribbon. That is why an old receipt in your wallet turns blank after a few months of hot pockets and sunlight. Characters print in a monospace font (Courier or clones) at 12–14 characters per line and 2.5 mm line height. There is no colour, no logo bitmap (only faint bank co-brand watermarks in the background), and no barcode on older dispensers. Newer 2024+ pumps optionally add a UPI-QR block and a 12-digit NPCI reference number, which is why some recent receipts run 140mm+ tall while older ones stop at 80mm.
Every OMC outlet in India follows this ordering with only minor cosmetic variation. The outlet block at the top prints OMC name, dealer name, address, PIN code and GSTIN (required by CBIC rules since April 2018 above a ₹200 threshold). The date and time come next in DD/MM/YYYY IST format. Then a sequential transaction ID that resets at midnight, followed by the dispenser number (DSM) and nozzle number (NOZ) which prove which pump was used. The core product line names the fuel (petrol/MS, diesel/HSD, CNG, or a premium grade like SPEED or POWER). Then rate per litre, volume and amount — all computed by the pump controller to two decimals and reflecting the daily rate revision that OMCs implement at 06:00 IST since June 2017. GST-shaped lines (CGST/SGST at 9% each) appear on request for readability though motor fuels are outside GST. The payment block prints MODE, TID/MID for cards, or a 12-digit UPI reference for BHIM/UPI payments. Finally the attendant ID — either a staff number or first name — required by the weights-and-measures inspectorate for accountability. Some Shell and premium HP outlets add loyalty program IDs at the very bottom.
Bharat Petroleum (BP): Header BHARAT PETROLEUM CORP LTD, uses ===== divider lines between blocks. Products include SPEED 97 (premium petrol) and SPEED DIESEL. GSTIN is printed on the second line. The bank co-brand is usually HDFC.
Indian Oil (IOCL): Header INDIAN OIL CORP LTD, uses ----- divider lines. Premium products are XTRAPREMIUM (petrol) and XTRAMILE DIESEL. IOCL was the first OMC to add a UPI-QR block to the receipt in November 2022, and it was mandated across all IOCL outlets by August 2024. The bank co-brand is Axis or SBI.
Hindustan Petroleum (HP): Header HINDUSTAN PETROLEUM CORP LTD, uses ~~~~~ dividers on older printers and standard ----- on 2023+ dispensers. Premium products are POWER (petrol) and TURBOJET DIESEL. HP receipts typically print the litre volume to three decimals — a habit inherited from their older Toshiba printer stack.
Shell: Cleaner spacing with === dividers, three-decimal volume, and inline nozzle serial numbers. Products: SHELL FUELSAVE PETROL, SHELL V-POWER PETROL, SHELL DIESEL. Shell prints the CO2 emission estimate (grams per km) as a footer line at outlets in Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi as of 2025 — a voluntary sustainability disclosure.
Petrol, diesel and ATF are still outside GST — they attract central excise plus state VAT instead, per the June 2017 GST Council decision that excluded these five items (crude, petrol, diesel, natural gas, ATF) from the GST regime pending a future notification. The 9% CGST + 9% SGST lines printed on some receipts are shown for format continuity but do not flow into your input-tax credit; the tax amounts you see there are the state VAT split shown in a GST-shaped block for readability. HR and finance teams know this; do not attempt to claim ITC on fuel purchases.
For reimbursement, most corporate expense policies require the original receipt with rate, volume, amount, date, station name and PIN; a matching fuel-card statement or bank UPI reference; vehicle registration recorded separately on the expense claim; and the outlet's GSTIN visible for amounts above ₹5,000. Finance software including Zoho Expense, Fyle, Happay and SAP Concur OCR-parses these fields directly into the claim workflow. If a scan fails because the thermal print has faded, the finance team usually asks the employee to re-upload a clearer photograph — not a reconstructed receipt.
The most common reasons users generate a receipt: the thermal print faded before the claim was filed; the receipt was lost or damaged and the fuel-card statement confirms the purchase; you need a placeholder receipt to test a new expense-management tool or OCR pipeline before rolling it out to real users; you are designing a thermal-printer template and need a spec-accurate mock; you are a QA engineer verifying receipt-parsing extraction against Indian OMC layouts. Reconstructing a receipt for a transaction that never happened is fraud in most jurisdictions. The tool does not add a watermark, but that is a design choice for the legitimate use cases above — not permission for anything else.
Open the petrol bill generator — every field described above is editable, the PDF preview updates as you type, and the download is instant. Free, no signup, mobile friendly. Works on iPhone Safari, Android Chrome, and any desktop browser.
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