E-invoicing to be extended to all firms from Apr 1 in phases: Finance secy

E-invoicing under the goods and services tax (GST) regime will be extended to companies having an annual turnover of more than Rs 100 crore from January 1, 2021 and to all from the next financial year for business to business (B2B) transactions, Finance Secretary A B Pandey said on Friday.

This mechanism will soon replace the existing e-way bill system, Pandey said. Besides, it can also eventually dispense with the present system of filing GST returns for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), he said.

At present, this requirement is for companies having annual turnover of over Rs 500 crore in any preceding three years. E-invoicing was made mandatory for these companies from the beginning of this month. However, a relief was provided that no penalty would be imposed on the companies if they take invoice reference number (IRN) within a month of transporting goods.

Under e-invoicing, companies have to generate IRN from a government portal and it has to be shown to the authorities while moving the goods.

Reviewing the position of e-invoicing, Pandey said its implementation was very encouraging and was becoming robust progressively.

The IRN generation has grown by 163 per cent from October 1 - 7, he said, adding it hit 1.37 million IRNs on the seventh day.

“It is a great step forward as e-invoicing has many advantages both for the business and the tax administration. Buyers and sellers will be able to have real time information of the invoices,' he said.