Vietnam: What is an e-invoice?

Vietnam: What is an e-invoice? (Source: internet)

* What is an e-invoice?

According to Clause 2, Article 3 of Vietnam's Decree No. 123/2020/ND-CP, “e-invoice” means an invoice, with or without the tax authority’s authentication code, in the form of electronic data, issued by the goods seller or service provider by using electronic instruments to record information on the sale of goods or service provision in accordance with regulations of the Law on accounting and the Law on taxation, including the invoices generated by POS cash registers that are digitally connected to tax authorities. To be specific:

- “authenticated e-invoice” means an e-invoice that is granted an authentication code by the tax authority before it is sent to the buyer by the goods seller or service provider.

The authentication code on an e-invoice is a unique serial number generated by the tax authority’s system and a series of characters encoded by the tax authority based on the information specified by the seller on the invoice.

- “unauthenticated e-invoice” means an e-invoice that is sent to the buyer by the goods seller or service provider without the tax authority’s authentication code.

* Preservation and storage of e-invoices:

According to Clause 2, Article 6 of Vietnam's Decree 123/2020/ND-CP:

- E-invoices/electronic records shall be stored and retained by electronic instruments.

- Authorities, organizations and individuals are entitled to select and apply methods for storage and retention of e-invoices/electronic records in conformity with their specific operations and capacity to apply information technology.

- They must be printed out or search upon request.

* Convert e-invoices into paper invoices:

Article 7 of Vietnam's Decree 123/2020/ND-CP stipulates the conversion of e-invoices into paper invoices as follows:

- Legal e-invoices/electronic records may be converted into paper invoices/records to meet the requirements of economic/financial transactions or at the request of tax authorities, audit, inspection or investigation authorities, and in accordance with regulations of laws on inspection and investigation.

- Contents of a paper invoice or record which is converted from an e-invoice or electronic record must correspond to those of the original e-invoice or electronic record.

- In case where an e-invoice or electronic record is converted into a paper invoice or record, this paper invoice or record shall be retained for bookkeeping and monitoring purposes only in accordance with regulations of the Laws on accounting and electronic transactions, and shall not be valid for use in transactions or payments, except for cases where invoices are generated from POS cash registers that are digitally connected to tax authorities in accordance with the regulations of Vietnam's Decree 123/2020/ND-CP.

Diem My

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