Accommodation tax return in Türkiye: a month-end checklist for hotels
Prepare your hotel's accommodation tax return in Türkiye with a clear month-end routine. This guide covers reconciliation steps, common differences, and the evidence pack your accountant needs.
Contents
Key takeaways
- The tax period is each month the business operates, and the return is declared and paid by the 26th of the following month (Gider Vergileri Kanunu No. 6802, Article 34, mevzuat.gov.tr).
- The tax is calculated on the total amount excluding VAT and must be shown as a separate line item on the facility's invoices and similar documents (Law No. 6802, Article 34).
- Books and documents are kept for five years from the calendar year after the year they relate to (Vergi Usul Kanunu No. 213, Article 253).
- Every figure on the return should trace to an issued document; a difference you cannot name is a correction waiting to happen, not a rounding.
- A month with no stays is a question for your accountant, not an assumption made at the front desk.
Accommodation tax (konaklama vergisi) is a monthly tax on overnight stays and the services sold with them. Under Article 34 of Law No. 6802, the return for each month is declared and paid by the 26th of the following month. The hotel supplies the numbers; the accountant files. Confirm your own case with your accountant.
The accountant asks for the month's accommodation tax figure. The front office sends a spreadsheet, the invoice list says something else, and nobody can say which one is right. The gap is rarely a software fault; it is a missing control routine that nobody wrote down. This article gives you that routine: what to hand over each month, how to reconcile three totals in a fixed order, how to explain the usual differences, and how to keep the evidence behind the return. It covers the accommodation tax return in Türkiye from the hotel side of the desk, not the accountant's side. For what the tax applies to and how it is charged on the bill, see what hotels charge accommodation tax on and how.
Who files the accommodation tax return, and how often?
The hotel supplies the numbers and the accountant files the return. The tax period is each month of the calendar year in which the business operates, and the return goes to the tax office the taxpayer is attached to for VAT. A taxpayer with no VAT liability files with the tax office where the facility is located. These rules sit in the eighth and ninth paragraphs of Article 34 of the Expenditure Taxes Law (opens in a new tab) (Law No. 6802, mevzuat.gov.tr, viewed 2 November 2026).
Each month's tax is declared by the evening of the 26th day of the following month and paid within the same period. The Ministry of Treasury and Finance sets the form, content and annexes of the return, so the layout can change between years. Check the current day and channel in the Revenue Administration's (GİB) e-Beyanname guidance with your accountant before the first filing of the year.
The scope is wide: overnight stays in hotels, motels, holiday villages, guesthouses and similar facilities, plus the other services sold together with the stay inside the facility, such as food, drink, activities and the use of pool, sports or thermal areas. This article is about the control routine, not the rate. Confirm the rate in force and your own liability with your accountant.
Watch out
Confirm the channel and the form version at the start of each year. The date in the law is the 26th; the channel and the form are what GİB publishes. Write the confirmed answer on the pack cover sheet so the next month does not reopen the question.
What does the hotel hand to the accountant each month?
A pack, not a number: the month's tax report from the hotel system, the list of documents issued, and a written explanation for every void, refund and deposit. The report should be cut by document date rather than by stay date, so it lines up with the invoice list.
The document list needs the fields the law requires an invoice to carry. Under Articles 229 and 230 of the Tax Procedure Law (opens in a new tab) (Law No. 213, mevzuat.gov.tr, viewed 1 November 2026), an invoice is the commercial document a merchant gives a customer, showing at least the date, series and sequence number, issuer details, customer details and the type, quantity, price and amount of what was sold. A list missing those fields cannot be reconciled.
Agency and company invoices that carry the tax should be listed separately from guest invoices, so the two totals can be checked against each other. Deposits and advance payments taken during the month come with the date each one became a taxable event, as your accountant defines it. And the pack ends with one honest line: what it does not cover, such as an outlet that bills on a separate system.
Checklist
- Tax report cut by document date
- List of documents issued, with series, number, date, payer, taxable amount and tax
- Void and refund pairs, each with a one-line reason
- Deposits and advance payments, with taxable-event dates
- Agency and company invoices listed separately
- Statement of what the pack excludes
- Cover sheet signed by the preparer
How do you reconcile the system report with the documents you issued?
Reconcile three totals in a fixed order: the night audit's revenue, the tax on documents issued, and the figure that goes on the return. Every gap gets a name before it gets a number. The night audit total is the anchor, because it is the one number the hotel produces before anyone outside the hotel touches it, and it comes from the closed business day (see the night audit checklist for closing the hotel business day).
The second total is the tax shown on documents actually issued in the month, taken from the invoice list, not from the system's estimate of what should have been issued. The third total is the line that will appear on the return. If the first two agree and the third does not, the problem is in the mapping, not in the hotel.
Reconcile by document date. A stay that begins in one month and ends in the next produces one document with one date, and that date decides which month it belongs to. For example, a property issues 40 documents in a month, but its system report counts 41 stays because one stay was invoiced in the following month: the difference is timing, it is written down with the document number, and it is not netted off.
| Total | Where it comes from | What a mismatch usually means |
|---|---|---|
| Night audit revenue | The closed business day | A document was issued outside the audited flow |
| Tax on documents issued | The invoice list, by document date | A void, refund or reissued document is missing from the list |
| System tax report | The hotel system | A stay date and a document date have been confused |
| Return figure | The accountant's working | The mapping from documents to return lines needs review before filing |
The rule for the desk: an explained difference gets one sentence and a document number; an unexplained difference goes to the accountant before filing, never after. Never adjust the system report to match the return. Adjust the explanation, or issue the missing correction document.
What are the usual differences, and how do you explain them?
Most differences come from four places: refunds and voids, cancelled or shortened stays, deposits, and invoices issued to agencies and companies instead of the guest. Each one has a documented answer, and the answer is the same shape every month.
Refund and credit documents reverse tax already declared on an earlier document. Keep the pair together in the pack, original and reversal, so the net is visible without arithmetic. A cancelled stay that was already invoiced is handled the same way: a reversing document, never a deletion and never a silent edit of the original (see how to void a folio charge without breaking the audit trail).
Deposits and advance payments are the difference most often decided at the wrong desk. When the tax becomes due depends on when the taxable event occurs, and that is an accountant's call, not a receptionist's. Agency and company invoices are issued to the account rather than to the guest, but the tax line still has to be there and still has to be shown separately (see invoicing agencies and companies through the city ledger).
No-shows, complimentary stays and staff stays each raise the same question: does a document arise, and does tax arise with it. Write the answer down once, with the accountant's name and the date, and reuse it. Charges moved between guest accounts are an internal transfer; the tax follows the document, not the transfer, so a moved charge should not create a second tax line.
Note
A correction is a void and a reverse, never a deletion. A deleted line cannot be reconciled, cannot be shown to an inspector, and cannot be explained to the accountant who has already declared the original.
Is a return still due in a month with no stays or a seasonal closure?
Ask your accountant before the first such month. The answer depends on your registration and operating status, and it is not a decision to make at the front desk. The law sets the period as each month the business operates (Law No. 6802, Article 34); what a seasonal closure means for that definition is a question for your accountant, not a reading you should improvise.
A zero return and no return are different things, and only the accountant can say which one applies to your facility. If the facility stops operating altogether, the registration itself may need action, and that action has its own timing.
Keep the calendar running anyway. Mark the closed month, record the decision and who gave it, and file the note in the same folder as the other months. A closed month still produces a pack. It is a short one, and its emptiness is the evidence.
Tip
Before the first closed month, send your accountant one written question: for a month with no stays, do we file a zero return, file nothing, or take another step, and what do you need from us to decide. Keep the reply. It turns a yearly argument into a one-time answer.
What goes in the month-end pack, and who signs it?
One folder per month, one signed cover sheet, and a named person on each side: the front office or finance manager who prepared it and the accountant who filed it. The cover sheet carries the month, the facility, the preparer, the date, the return figure, the reconciled total and a numbered list of explained differences. Behind it sit the working papers and a copy of the filed return.
Sign-off is by name and date, not by role. A change after sign-off creates a new version of the cover sheet rather than an edit to the old one. Store every month in the same place and the same shape, searchable by month and document number, so that a question in March about last August takes minutes.
The pack is the evidence that the return matches the documents, and it is the first thing anyone asking about a past month will want to see. The hotel system behind the pack matters here. AI Otel's billing module is built: financial records are never deleted, corrections are voided and reversed, and night audit closes the business day. The software is complete and working, ahead of launch.
Checklist
- Signed cover sheet with return figure and reconciled total
- Tax report by document date
- List of documents issued
- Void and refund pairs with reasons
- Deposits and advance payments
- Agency and company invoices
- Copy of the filed return
- The accountant's written answers to standing questions, such as the closed-month decision
How long must a hotel keep the books and documents behind the return?
Five years, counted from the calendar year after the year the records relate to, under Article 253 of the Tax Procedure Law (Law No. 213, mevzuat.gov.tr, viewed 1 November 2026). The count starts the year after, not the year of the document: for example, a document dated 2026 is counted from 2027, so the five years run to the end of 2031.
The rule covers books and documents, which includes the invoices and the pack that explains them. A pack that explains a document is worth keeping for as long as the document. Keep the reversal with its original; a credit document without the invoice it reverses explains nothing five years later.
Store in a form you can produce and read. A scan nobody can find is not a record, and a folder named after a person rather than a month is a future problem. Other retention rules may apply to your business, for example under commercial law. Confirm the longest applicable period with your accountant rather than assuming five years is the ceiling.
What to do next
Build the pack template this month, before the next filing: cover sheet, document list, void and refund pairs, deposit list, agency invoices, filed return. Then the routine is fixed and the only thing that changes each month is the content. The period, the reconciliation, the differences, the closed months, the sign-off and the retention rule are one chain, and a break anywhere in it shows up as an unexplained number on the return. If you want to see how a system can support this routine rather than fight it, request a briefing.
Frequently asked questions
Is the accommodation tax return filed every month?
The tax period is each month of the calendar year in which the business operates, and each month's tax is declared by the evening of the 26th of the following month and paid within the same period (Gider Vergileri Kanunu No. 6802, Article 34). Whether a month with no stays still needs a return is a question for your accountant, not a general rule.
Is accommodation tax included in the VAT base?
No. Article 34 of Law No. 6802 requires the tax to be shown separately on the facility's invoices and similar documents and states that it is not included in the VAT base. Practically, that means the tax is its own line, and the reconciliation in this article treats it as its own total.
Where does the return go if the hotel has no VAT liability?
The return goes to the tax office the taxpayer is attached to for VAT. A taxpayer without VAT liability files with the tax office where the facility is located (Law No. 6802, Article 34). Confirm your own attachment with your accountant, since it decides where the return is filed.
What happens if the return and the invoices do not match?
Find the difference first, then decide the fix with your accountant. Most gaps are timing, a refund, a deposit or an agency invoice, and each one can be explained with a document number. Corrections are made by voiding and reversing, never by deleting a record, so the trail stays readable.
How long should a hotel keep the documents behind the return?
Books and documents are kept for five years from the calendar year after the year they relate to (Vergi Usul Kanunu No. 213, Article 253). Keep the month-end pack with them, and ask your accountant whether a longer period applies to your business under other rules.
Sources
- Gider Vergileri Kanunu (Kanun Numarası 6802), Article 34 (opens in a new tab)T.C. Cumhurbaşkanlığı Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi (mevzuat.gov.tr)mevzuat.gov.tr
- Vergi Usul Kanunu (Kanun No. 213), consolidated text (Articles 229, 230 and 253) (opens in a new tab)Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye, Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi (mevzuat.gov.tr)mevzuat.gov.tr
- Gider Vergileri Kanunu (Kanun Numarası 6802), Article 34 (eighth and ninth paragraphs) (opens in a new tab)T.C. Cumhurbaşkanlığı Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi (mevzuat.gov.tr)mevzuat.gov.tr