Biz will have 30 days to generate e-voices for B2B sales in Oct: CBIC

Businesses will have 30 days' time to generate e-invoice for B2B transactions for the month of October, the CBIC said on Wednesday.

Under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) law, companies with turnover of over Rs 500 crore will have to generate e-invoice for B2B transactions from October 1.

The Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) said even after more than nine months of the first notification, some businesses are still not ready.

"Accordingly, as a last chance, in the initial phase of implementation of e-invoice, it has been decided that the invoices issued by such taxpayers during October 2020 without following the manner prescribed ....., shall be deemed to be valid and the penalty leviable ...,for such non-adherence to provisions, shall stand waived if the Invoice Reference Number (IRN) for such invoice is obtained from the Invoice Reference Portal (IRP) within 30 days of date of invoice," CBIC said.

Giving an example, the CBIC said if a person has issued an invoice dated October 3, 2020 without obtaining IRN but reports the details of such invoice to IRP and obtains the IRN of the invoice on or before November 2, 2020,then penalty would be waived.

"It may be noted that no such relaxation would be available for the invoices issued from 1stNovember 2020 and such invoices issued in violation of rule 48(4) of the CGST Rules 2017 would not be valid and all the applicable provisions of CGST Act and Rules would apply for the said violation," the CBIC said.

Under e-invoicing, taxpayers have to generate invoices on their internal systems (ERP/accounting/billing software) and then report it online to the IRP.

The IRP will validate the information provided in the invoices and return the digitally signed e-Invoices with a unique Invoice Reference Number (IRN) along with a QR codeto the taxpayer.