Most salaried professionals earning ₹15 Lakh+ per year in India are legally eligible for a significant pre-tax benefit on their car — but only if their employer has set it up. If yours hasn't, you're leaving ₹1–2 Lakh per year on the table. Here's exactly why most companies haven't, and what you can do about it today.
Why Most Companies Don't Offer It
It's not ignorance — most HR teams know the benefit exists. The problem is operational complexity. To offer a car lease, a company needs:
- A signed agreement with an NBFC or leasing company
- Payroll configuration to handle the pre-tax deduction
- TDS 194C filing on lease payments to the NBFC
- Form 16 update to show the perquisite value correctly
- A legal framework (SPV or hypothecation) for each employee
The large leasing companies — Ayvens (formerly ALD), Orix India, Quiklyz — only serve companies with large fleets. They won't negotiate with a 50-person company. So the benefit that's been in law since 1962 ends up available only to TCS, Infosys, Goldman Sachs employees.
LeaseBridge removes all of this. We handle the NBFC relationship, the legal structure, the payroll file, the TDS computation, and the documents. Your HR team registers once and never touches it again.
What It Actually Saves You
Under IT Rules 2026 (effective 1 April 2026), the taxable perquisite for an employer-provided car is:
- Electric vehicle: ₹2,000/month (best rate — actually reduced in 2026)
- ICE car ≤1.6L: ₹5,000/month
- ICE car >1.6L: ₹7,000/month
The entire lease amount comes out of CTC before tax. Only the perquisite value is added back. On a ₹15L EV lease over 4 years, a ₹40L CTC professional saves approximately ₹1.15 Lakh per year — and owns the car at ₹1 at lease end.
For a ₹1 Crore home lease, the benefit is even larger — ₹2–4 Lakh per year — because the housing perquisite (10% of basic salary) is unchanged under IT Rules 2026.
How to Get Your Company to Offer It
The most effective path: forward the LeaseBridge calculator to your HR or Finance team with a simple note. Here's what happens next:
- HR registers on LeaseBridge (takes 10 minutes, free)
- LeaseBridge signs the NBFC agreement and sets up the legal structure
- HR receives a payroll integration file — no manual calculation
- Your lease starts within 2 weeks
The key message for HR: zero overhead after setup. No fleet management. No insurance handling. No maintenance coordination. The NBFC manages the asset. LeaseBridge handles compliance. HR just runs the payroll deduction.
What If HR Still Says No?
Some companies won't move quickly regardless of how simple you make it. In the meantime, make sure you're capturing every other available benefit: NPS contribution (if your employer matches), meal cards (now ₹200/meal tax-free under IT Rules 2026), phone and internet reimbursement, and gift vouchers (up to ₹15,000/year tax-free).
These are smaller than the car or home lease benefit — but they compound. While you wait for the bigger win, don't leave the smaller ones on the table either.