Interior Design Quotation Format India: What to Include

An interior design quotation format has one job that a normal freelance quotation does not: it has to survive being compared line by line against two other designers' quotes, usually by a client who does not know what any of the lines mean.

That comparison is where most interior projects are won or lost, and it is almost never won on price. It is won by the quote that makes the client feel like they understand what they are buying. A quote that says "Living room: ₹4,50,000" loses to one that shows the same number broken into eleven lines, even when the eleven lines add up to more.

Here is the structure that holds up.

Interior design quotation format: what goes at the top

Standard, but two of these get skipped and cause problems later.

• Your name or studio name, address, phone, email
• Client name, site address (not their billing address, the actual site)
• Quotation number and date
• Validity date. Material rates in India move. A quote with no expiry is a quote you are honouring in November at August prices.
• Project scope in one line. "2BHK full interiors, 1,150 sq ft, Whitefield" prevents the argument about whether the balcony was included.

Room-wise, not category-wise

This is the single biggest formatting decision, and most designers get it backwards.

Category-wise means grouping everything by trade: all carpentry together, all electrical together, all painting together. It is how you think, because it is how you buy.

Room-wise means grouping by space: living room, master bedroom, kitchen, and so on, with each room's carpentry, electrical and finishing inside it.

Quote room-wise. Clients think in rooms. They do not think "I want ₹1,80,000 of carpentry", they think "what am I spending on the kitchen". Room-wise quoting also makes it far easier to have the value-engineering conversation, because the client can drop or defer a whole room instead of asking you to shave 10% off everything.

Inside each room, order the lines the way the work happens: civil, carpentry, electrical, painting, furnishing.

Line items that stop disputes

For each line, four columns: description, quantity with unit, rate, amount.

The description is where the money is protected. Compare these two lines:

• "Wardrobe: ₹85,000"
• "Master bedroom wardrobe, 8ft x 7ft, 18mm BWP plywood carcass, 1mm laminate finish, soft-close hinges, 2 drawers, hanging rod: 56 sq ft at ₹1,520/sq ft = ₹85,120"

The second one is not longer for the sake of it. Every specification in there is a thing a client will otherwise assume was included at a higher grade. Plywood type, laminate thickness, hardware brand, and the count of drawers are the four most common sources of "but I thought that was included".

Use the units your trade actually uses: running feet for kitchen platforms, square feet for wardrobes and false ceiling, per point for electrical, per piece for fixtures. Mixed units in one quotation are normal in interiors and clients accept them.

Materials and labour: split or combined

Both are used in India. Pick one deliberately.

Combined (rate per sq ft, materials plus labour) is cleaner to read and easier to compare, and it hides your margin. Most designers doing turnkey work quote this way.

Split (materials at cost plus labour, or a design fee plus execution) suits clients who want to buy their own materials, and it is common when the client is closely involved or the project is partial.

The mistake is switching between the two inside one quotation without labelling it. If your kitchen is turnkey and your living room is design-only, say so on the line, with different terms for each.

The exclusions list is not optional

This is the section that separates a quotation from an argument. Write down, explicitly, what the price does not cover. The usual suspects in Indian interior projects:

• Civil work, demolition, plumbing shifting, waterproofing
• Society charges, lift charges, permissions, watchman charges
• Electrical load enhancement or DB upgrades
• Appliances, unless individually listed
• Curtains, artwork, plants, styling accessories
• Loose furniture not listed
• GST, if you are quoting exclusive
• Anything at the site that is not visible until work starts

Add one line about site conditions: "Rates assume a clear, handed-over site with water and power available." Every interior designer in India has lost three weeks to a site that was not ready, and that clause is how you charge for it.

Payment schedule on the quotation itself

Do not leave this to a separate conversation. A common structure for turnkey interiors:

• 10% on quotation approval, to start drawings
• 40% on work order, before material procurement
• 30% at carcass or mid-execution stage
• 15% on installation
• 5% on handover

Adjust the split to your cash flow, but keep the last instalment small. A 25% final payment is a 25% payment you will chase for two months. Five percent is a number clients settle to close the project.

State what each payment releases: drawings, procurement, execution start. This turns "when do I pay" into "what do I get", which is a much easier conversation. If you are structuring a project this way, invoicing a project in milestones covers how the billing side lines up, and payment terms for Indian freelancers covers the Net 15 versus Net 30 question.

Revisions clause

Interiors run on revisions and everyone pretends otherwise at quotation stage.

Write the number. "Includes 2 rounds of design revisions per room. Additional rounds at ₹X per room." You will almost never invoke it. Its job is to make the fourth revision request a conversation instead of a resentment.

GST on an interior design quotation

If your turnover is under ₹20 lakh (₹10 lakh in Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura) you are not required to register, and the quotation simply carries no GST line. Do not write "GST extra as applicable" if you are not registered, because clients read that as a hidden cost.

If you are registered, state clearly whether your rates are inclusive or exclusive, and show the rate. Interior work often mixes goods and services, and the classification is genuinely not obvious, so confirm the applicable rate with a CA rather than copying whatever last year's quote said.

Either way, a quotation is not a tax document. It is a priced offer. The tax treatment lands on the invoice, and invoicing without a GST number covers what that looks like below the threshold.

What happens after they say yes

The gap between "approved" and "work started" is where interior projects leak. The client says yes on WhatsApp, then nothing is signed, then the scope drifts.

Convert the approved quotation into the next document while the yes is fresh. On Riffit that is one action: an accepted quotation becomes an invoice with the line items, amounts and client details carried across, so you are not retyping a 40-line quote at 11pm. It can become a contract too, which starts from the client details and the total rather than the full line-item list. Once the client asks for changes or accepts, revising the quote creates a new version under the same number, which matters in interiors where you will quote the same flat three times before anyone signs. How to send a revised quotation covers the wording and the version numbering.

Quotations are unlimited on both the free and Pro plans, so the revision cycle does not cost you anything.

For the general freelance version of this document, quotation format for Indian freelancers has the simpler structure.

FAQ

Send the quotation before the client sits down with the next designer. That beats a better format sent three days later. With Riffit you build the quotation on the dashboard, send it for one-tap approval, and convert the accepted version straight into an invoice or a contract.