Compliance Category: Informations sur le mandat fiscal

First step on e-invoicing implementation

While the Bahrani Cabinet is reviewing the proposed suspension of VAT, the National Bureau of Revenue has launched a survey to estimate the volume and nature of VAT invoicing, which included a mandatory questionnaire on invoicing patterns and the use of e-invoicing. It is likely that this information will be used in the preparation for electronic invoicing.

Bahrain is likely to follow Saudi Arabia’s lead in implementing e-invoicing in a pre-clearance model, which will require VAT-registered businesses to submit their sales invoices to the NBR for approval before sharing them with customers.

Plan to introduce e-invoicing systems

Oman introduced VAT in April 2021 as part of the GCC Common VAT Agreement, with a standard VAT rate of 5%.
Recently, Oman Tax Authority expressed its interest in introducing e-invoicing in a gradual phase, opening it up to VAT taxpayers on a voluntary basis initially, and subsequently on a compulsory basis. It is unclear when the e-invoicing system will be implemented, but we can expect it to be implemented during 2023.

Deadline fast approaching for transition to CFDI version 4.0

In line with recent updates, you will be aware that the CFDI 4.0 and the Payment Receipt 2.0 in Mexico will become mandatory to use from 1st July 2022.

CFDI 3.3 will not be compliant from 1st July 2022 onwards, which means that it will be rejected on and after this date. To this effect, it’s imperative that businesses are prepared to accommodate CFDI 4.0 in advance of 1st July 2022 onwards. Tungsten will support the new version.

European Parliament and the harmonisation of e-invoicing

One of the underlying aims of the European Parliament has been the harmonisation of e-invoicing across Member States. This naturally will lead to increased automation, efficacy and reduced costs associated with the e-invoicing process.

To this effect, the European Parliament has called on the European Commission to set up a common standard by 2022.

In related objectives, there is also a request to consider the role of e-invoicing in real-time reporting. We have already seen some EU Member States such as Hungary successfully deploy this.

Following the success of mandate in Italy in significantly reducing the VAT gap, the European Parliament has called for a gradual adoption of obligatory e-invoicing- with an emphasis on small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Considering the upcoming French mandate, there has also been renewed interest to consider the needs of this particular group of taxpayers, and it looks like this this is gaining traction in Europe, too. Furthermore, there is a call for invoices to only be administered via certified systems to ensure full data protection.

By 2023, it is anticipated that the system will produce compliant documents for taxpayers, again with a focus on SMEs.

Further extension to the transitional period for the Carta Porte

The original timeline communicated by the tax administration in Mexico, the Servicio de Administracion Tributaria (SAT), was that CFDI 4.0 and Carte Porte was to become mandatory from 1 May 2022, with a transition period between 1 January and 30 April 2022.

The SAT subsequently announced that the mandatory usage of CFDI 4.0 was delayed by a further 2 months, to become mandatory as of 30 June 2022. However, more recently on 9 March 2022, the Mexican Tax Administration issued a press release indicating that the transitional period has been further extended up until 30 September 2022 for the Carta Porte.

The CFDI 4.0 and associated documents continues, for now, to be mandatory from 30 June 2022. The usage of these documents continues to be optional up until 30 June 2022.

Tungsten Network has successfully been able to process the Carta Porte since January 2022.

Joint incentive to reduce the VAT gap

Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg representatives have convened to discuss plans to reduce the VAT gap.

Although Continuous Transaction Controls (CTC) have proven to be extremely popular in the past few years, with a means to reducing the VAT gap, the VAT gap remains high- 134 million Euros was lost in revenue the EU in 2019.

Shared borders and economic interests between the 3 countries have prompted the countries to work together to reduce this gap yet further- a key factor in the implementation of e-invoicing mandates.

New e-invoicing documents published

B2G e-invoicing is expected to go live in 2022, and B2B e-invoicing in 2023.

Considering the upcoming e-invoicing mandate, the Serbian Ministry of Finance has published some new documents. These outline the final specifications of the application interface for the e-invoicing system.

XML formats based on the UBL 2.1 standard will be available for the following documents:

  • Advance payment invoices;
  • Invoices related to VAT exempted transactions;
  • Public procurement invoices;
  • Credit notes related to a certain period in time;
  • Credit notes for multiple invoices;
  • Debit notes related to multiple invoices;
  • Debit notes related to a certain period.

Mandatory ‘real-time’ e-invoicing expected in 2024

Many European countries are reviewing their plans for e-invoicing implementation and Slovakia is no exception. Despite e-invoicing expected to take hold in the country some way away yet- in 2024- the Ministry of Finance is setting out some clear timeframes to accomplish this.

Some key dates are summarised below:

  • 2021: Ministry of Finance introduces a law regarding sending invoice structured data to the Financial Directorate; public consultation with stakeholders commences
  • 2022: Law expected to finalise
  • 2023: Law effective from this date
  • 1 January 2024: obligation to use e-invoicing expected

The passing of the year between the ‘effective date’ and the obligation to use e-invoicing indicates that the Slovakian tax authorities acknowledge the difficulties that can be expected in the transition from paper to e-invoicing. This time should allow Slovakian taxpayers to familiarise themselves with the technical specifications, e-invoicing process and finer detail relating to e-invoicing.

Small businesses will get further assistance via a free online application ‘Virtual invoice’. This aims to reduce administrative burdens and offer a more simplified process to smaller businesses. This includes the ability to issue an invoice via a mobile phone and send this to the national e-invoice system.

Mandatory B2G e-invoicing

A Royal Decree has been published outlining the modalities regarding the obligation for entrepreneurs in the context of public contracts and concession contracts (B2G).

Below are a few key timeframes regarding e-invoicing obligations:

  • 1 October 2022: public contracts and concessions the estimated value of which is less than European threshold
  • 1 April 2023: public contracts and concessions the estimated value of which is less than EUR 30 000 excluding value added tax, but less than European threshold
  • 1 October 2023: all public contracts and concessions

The Official Royal Decree can be found via the following link.

B2B e-invoicing mandate developments

Developments in the B2B e-invoicing sphere are gaining increasing momentum in Spain.

Spain published a Royal Draft Decree on 21 February 2022 in respect of mandatory B2B e-invoicing in Spain.

The draft decree outlines the obligations for taxpayers to comply with the mandate from 1 January 2024.

Amongst the requirements outlined in the technical specifications are the requirements for invoices to include a specific hash.

Spain is a key market for Tungsten Network. We are closely following B2B e-invoicing developments in Spain.

B2B Technical specifications – Version 1.2

The French Tax Authorities have published an updated version of the external specifications on their website.

These specifications include new use cases and the service mode of the public billing portal is developed.

It is expected that further work will be undertaken on the specifications, to be completed in the summer.

Further information can be found here.

Potential free archiving service

It is proposed that the French tax authorities will offer a free archiving service to all taxable persons using the French National Portal (PPF) for the issuance / receipt of invoices following the first-phase introduction of the e-invoicing and e-reporting obligations in July 2024.

It is expected that the Minister of Economy, Finance and Recovery will provide a definitive steer on this in due course.

Proposal of e-transport

Romania is further extending the scope of taxpayers subject to fiscal obligations as we approach the deadline of 1st July 2022 for mandatory reporting of ‘high risk fiscal products’ through the national e-invoicing system. In line with other government mandates, a primary objective of this is for tax authorities to have greater visibility over transactions and thus reduce the VAT gap.

Romania has now honed in on tax owed to the state budget for the transport of goods specifically with a high fiscal risk; this has been identified as an area of potential exploitation, and the Romanian government is keen to reduce the tax gap in relation to this. To this effect, the Romanian government has published a draft Emergency Ordinance for the establishment of the National Transport Monitoring System of goods with high fiscal risk.

If this proposal is adopted, it will become optional from 1 April 2022 and mandatory as of 1st July 2022- therefore following the same timeframes as the reporting of high risk fiscal products to the national e-invoicing system.

The following groups that trade goods with high risk are anticipated to be in scope:
· the consignee named on the import customs declaration or the consignor named on the export customs declaration, for import/export cases;
· the beneficiary from Romania in cases of local transactions or intra-Community supplies of high tax risk goods;
· the supplier from Romania in cases of local transactions or intra-Community supplies of high tax risk goods;
· the warehouse administrator in case of the high tax risk goods which are subject to intra-Community transactions in transit, both for the goods unloaded in Romania for storage purposes or for the purposes of forming a new transport of one or many batches of goods, or for the goods loaded after storage or after a new local transport of goods was formed for one or many batches of the goods.

Tungsten Network will monitor developments regarding when this draft emergency Ordinance will be approved.

Obligation for retail stores to use e-invoicing for high-risk fiscal products

At the start of the year, we communicated that Romania would mandate e-invoicing for B2B transactions which related to ‘high risk fiscal products’. This obligation now extends to retail stores in Romania.
This means that if customers request invoices, these will now have to be issued through the RO e-Factura system, if the transaction involves a high-risk fiscal product.
The extension of taxpayers now subject to the mandatory e-invoicing requirement relating to high-risk fiscal products demonstrate Romania’s motivation to oversee more tax transactions and reduce tax fraud further in the country.

Derogation from European Commission to mandate e-invoicing

Poland has now received the derogation from the European Commission to mandate e-invoicing in the country.
The derogation is required by each EU Member State if they wish to mandate e-invoicing in their respective country, as formal permission is needed to deviate from the right to receive an invoice in paper format (as per the EU Council Directive 2006/112/EC of 28 November 2006).
This effectively means that Poland can now implement mandatory e-invoicing in the country.
E-invoicing in Poland is expected to be enforced from April 2023. A firm date has not yet been set.
Tungsten Network will communicate when a firmer date is communicated.