The General Department of Taxation is preparing resources to be able to complete the "coverage" of e-invoices nationwide by July 1, 2022.

The Tax sector has been installing technical infrastructure ready
for the deployment of e-invoices.

Mobilizing all resources

Since November 2021, six provinces and cities including Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Quang Ninh, Hai Phong, Phu Tho and Binh Dinh will officially expand the e-invoice programme according to the provisions of Circular 78/2021/TT. The BTC guides in detail a number of articles of the Law on Tax Administration No. 38 and Decree 123/2020/ND-CP.

According to Mr. Pham Quang Toan, Director of the Information Technology Department (General Department of Taxation), in the first phase, the General Department of Taxation deploys e-invoice management software on existing technical infrastructure.

It will add and upgrade the infrastructure for the e-invoice system in April 2022. At this time, the General Department of Taxation has reviewed and arranged to make the most of the technical infrastructure, completed the technical design, built the parameters and completed the installation of technical infrastructure ready for deployment, testing invoice management software in the near future for the above six provinces and cities.

According to Mr Toan, during the implementation process, the General Department of Taxation will mobilize resources from the e-invoice implementation team of six tax departments to directly participate in the stages of building and deploying e-invoice management software, including: analyze business requirements, design and program application functions on the direct invoicing portal of the General Department of Taxation, e-invoice data receiving portal and e-invoice data processing system.

Recently, the General Department of Taxation issued Decision No. 1450/QD-TCT stipulating the components containing professional data of e-invoices and the method of transmission with tax authorities.

According to regulations, e-invoice data components and transmission messages include: data format; the tax authority's code on the e-invoice; digital signatures; messages transmitted and received between organizations providing services to connect, receive, transmit and store e-invoice data with tax authorities or enterprises selling goods, providing data transfer connection services to the tax office by direct mail. Not through the organization providing services to connect, receive, transmit and store e-invoice data with tax authorities; QR Code on e-invoice; the notification of the result of issuance of the e-invoice code of the tax authority; unencrypted e-invoice data transfer message to tax authorities.

According to the General Department of Taxation, this is an important regulation for organizations and individuals using e-invoices, service providers and tax agencies to uniformly deploy technical solutions to meet requirements, store, transmit and receive e-invoice data.

Before promulgating, the General Department of Taxation has reviewed to amend and supplement regulations on components containing e-invoice data and methods of transmission with tax authorities to be consistent with the provisions of Decree No. 123/2020/ ND-CP and Circular No. 78/2021/TT-BTC. The General Department of Taxation has also consulted with relevant units, agencies and some e-invoice solution providers.

Receiving dossiers of service providers

In addition to the preparation of technical infrastructure, the General Department of Taxation also prepares to receive documents from organizations providing e-invoice services in six deployment areas.

Currently, there are about 800 organizations providing e-invoice solutions according to Circular No. 32/2011/TT-BTC. Pursuant to Circular No. 78/2021/TT-BTC, the General Department of Taxation selects an e-invoice service provider to sign a contract to connect, receive, transmit and store e-invoice data with the tax authority, corresponding to two implementation phases.

Regarding organizations providing e-invoice services with and without codes for sellers and buyers, the General Department of Taxation will receive the organization's dossier and publicly post a document describing the service and its commitment on the Portal of the General Department of Taxation so that organizations and individuals can research and select services for creating, storing and transmitting e-invoices.

Another content that is being urgently completed by the General Department of Taxation is to build a list of contents for the proof of electronic tax service providers. According to the provisions of Decree No. 123/2020/ND-CP, e-invoice service providers include: e-invoice solution providers with tax authority codes and no tax authority codes for sellers and buyer; organizations providing services of receiving, transmitting and storing e-invoice data.

“Based on the criteria specified for these two types of organizations in Circular No. 78/2021/TT-BTC, the General Department of Taxation is developing and finalizing the list of content of supporting documents for the application. Organizations providing e-invoice solutions with the tax authority's code and without the tax authority's code for sellers and buyers when the organization wishes to publicize the e-invoice service on the website of the General Department of Taxation; develop a list of contents for dossiers for service providers of receiving, transmitting and storing e-invoice data that have signed contracts with tax authorities," said the representative of the General Department of Taxation.