India e-invoice delayed to 1 October 2020

The Indian government has delayed the mandatory introduction of electronic invoices until 1 October 2020. The plan had been to impose the e-invoice regime from 1 April 2020 for larger businesses. The Goods and Services Tax Council (GSTC) agreed the cancellation today.

The GSTC also delayed the implementation of QR Codes on invoices until 1 October 2020. The e-Wallet scheme has been postponed until to 31 March 2021.

The delay was introduced due to poor take-up of the central upload service during the voluntary trial period, which started on 1 January 2020 for businesses with a turnover about 100 crore. This has prevented load testing of the system for a full roll out in April. In addition, businesses need additional time to adopt the new invoice schema which is still being modified.

The Council has already abandoned the plan to adopt the international standard Peppol-model for electronic invoicing. It is switching to a requirement to create the e-invoice on the taxpayer’s own accounting system. The GST e-invoice is then submitted to the Invoice Registration Portal (IRP) by the taxpayer. This adds a unique Invoice Reference Number (IRN), including a QR code with captures invoice details. This digitally-signed invoice is passed to the GST Network and e-waybill system within 24 hours. The taxpayer is returned the IRN. The customer is issued with the approved invoice

The phased rollout this year will be as follows:

GST was introduced in India in 2018, consolidating a range of consumption taxes. Some of the more complex aspects of the new regime, including central clearing of sales and purchase invoices, were never rolled out.