E-invoicing: who it applies to and what breaks first
E-invoicing does not change what you charge or how you account for it. It inserts a mandatory registration step between raising an invoice and it being valid — and every process that assumed an invoice becomes real the moment it is printed has to be revisited.
2 min readOadbox
What the obligation actually is
Businesses above a notified aggregate turnover threshold must report business-to-business invoices, export invoices and credit and debit notes to an invoice registration portal, which returns a reference number and a signed QR code. An invoice in scope without that reference is not a valid tax invoice, and the buyer's credit is at risk.
The threshold has been lowered several times since introduction and applies from the financial year in which turnover was first crossed, not only the current one. Check where you sit before assuming you are outside it.
The four things that break
- Invoice numbering — series must be unique and cannot be reused after a failed attempt.
- Cancellations — an invoice registered and then cancelled has a narrow window, after which only a credit note works.
- Amendments — corrections happen through the return, not by editing the registered invoice.
- Dispatch — goods leaving against an unregistered invoice is the expensive version of this failure.
Reporting deadlines are part of the rule now
Larger taxpayers face a time limit on how old an invoice can be when it is reported. An invoice sitting in a failed queue for weeks may become impossible to register at all.
This turns a technical backlog into a permanent tax problem, which is why the queue needs a daily owner rather than a monthly review.
Turnover thresholds and reporting time limits have changed repeatedly. Confirm the current position for your turnover band before designing around it.
Written by the Oadbox team. Something here not match how it works in your business? We would genuinely like to hear it — connect@oadbox.com.