e-Invoicing FAQ's (Frequently Asked Questions)

E-Invoicing under GST is the process of validating the B2B, export Invoices online, on a unified portal & giving a unique IRN & QR code to the said authenticated Invoice.

The implementation of the e-Invoicing System was extended in the 39th GST Council Meeting, to 1st October 2020.

E-Invoices are generated when B2B and export invoices are validated on the IRP & are sanctioned with a unique IRN & QR Code.

E-Invoices are mandatory for all the Businesses having an annual aggregate turnover of Rs. 100 Crore & more. Additionally all Businesses with a turnover of Rs. 500 Crore must generate QR Codes for their B2C Invoices.

No, the Taxpayer must generate their Invoices normally in their ERP or Billing Systems. These invoices further needs to be authenticated by uploading them on a unified Government Portal- the IRP.

The Government of India has given a unified Portal for e-Invoicing called the Invoice Registration Portal or the IRP for authentication of Invoices.

E-Invoicing is essentially a Government initiative to curb the evasion of taxes through fake Invoices & E-Way Bills. But as an additional benefit, e-Invoice also makes the GSTR Filing process and E-way bill generation simple & online.

Apart from the B2B invoices, credit notes, debit notes, export invoices & B2B reverse charge invoices are to be reported to the IRP & IRP shall generate IRNs for these documents as well.

The IRP- Invoice Registration Portal is the unified portal for Invoice registration. The IRN- Invoice Registration Number- The unique 64 character reference number given to each Invoice post-authentication. The QR code- Quick reference code, it has the essential details of the Invoice.

The IRN is used to identify the e-Invoices & hence it is only assigned to authenticated Invoices. It is proof that the e-Invoice is valid, an e-Invoice without an IRN shall be considered invalid. The QR Code, on the other hand, is used for quick access to the essential information about the e-Invoice. The user only needs to scan the code & it shall display the important invoice information such as the Supplier & Buyer GSTIN, Invoice value, and number of items, IRN, & HSN Code.

All eligible Businesses tend to get QR codes mandatorily on e-Invoicing of their B2B Invoices, and Businesses with an annual turnover of Rs. 500 Crores also get QR codes for their B2C Invoices.

The user can use their e-Way Bill Credentials to log-in to the IRP. If the user doesn't have their e-Way Bill credentials, they can register directly to the IRP by entering their GSTIN, post which the user will receive an OTP to their registered number. The user can then create a username & password.

Invoices are rejected in case they have incorrect values or if any mandatory fields are missing in the e-Invoice. AN invoice shall be also be rejected if the invoice number is repeated i.e. duplicate invoice number is found in e-Invoice payload. The user must recheck all the mandatory fields & enter correct values & submit the Invoice to the IRP again.

The GSTN has considered the possibility of the buffer & hence has created 10 IRPs for users to avoid the over trafficking & lagging of websites.

Yes, Part-1 of the e-Way Bill shall be auto-populated using the Invoice data from the IRP. The user, however, would have to fill the Part-2 of the e-Way Bill manually.

No, the taxpayer must file their own GST returns as before, but after the implementation of e-Invoices, the data for filing the Returns shall be auto-populated in the form of Annexure-1.

The SCHEMA is a format of e-Invoices specified by the GSTN. All the e-Invoices shall be generated in the given format, the mandatory & non-mandatory fields are decided by the GSTN. The e-Invoices must fill the mandatory fields to avoid the rejection of e-Invoices. However, the non-mandatory fields are for the users to choose from & are optional.

The user must first log-in to the IRP, & click on 'Print' on the left side of the dashboard. The user then needs to enter the IRN of the e-Invoice they wish to print, then click on 'Go'.

This means that either the User has either already created their Credentials for IRP, or are already registered on the e-Way Bill Portal. The user can use the e-Way Bill Credentials to log into the IRP. In case the user has forgotten the password or User ID, the same can be reset from the Home page, using their GSTIN & OTP.

IRN is a unique number to identify the e-Invoice hence, no two invoices can have the same IRN.

Reverse Charge Mechanism states that under certain cases of categorized goods the tax liability falls over the Buyer instead of the Supplier.

Post-generation, the e-Invoices are available on the IRP for 24 hours only.

The Businesses must be registered to the GST Portal & the e-Invoice or e-Way Bill Portal in order to generate the IRN for their Invoices.

Yes, the discounting feature is available on the IRP, for item-level as well as on Invoice value.

E-Invoice once generated cannot be modified. The user must cancel the e-Invoice & create a fresh e-Invoice with the correct input, within 24 hours of generation.

The bulk generation facility has been enabled by the IRP. The user needs to log in to the IRP & click on 'Bulk Upload' under the head 'e-Invoice'. Create a JSON File in the format given by the IRP & enter the mandatory details of the Invoices, then click on 'upload'. As an output, the IRP gives the list of e-Invoices or errors if any.

The IRP can be integrated with ERPs through GSPs & APIs, such as GSTHero. Post-integration the user can perform all the e-Invoice operations from within their ERPs itself.

E-Invoicing makes Reconciliation, automated, transparent & thorough. The Taxpayers cannot hide any transactions post the implementation of the e-Invoices. All Invoices shall be reported to the IRP & the same data shall be used to File the GST Returns. This should eliminate the chances of missing or wrong reporting of invoices.

e-Invoices are going to play a major role in the context of GST Compliance. Basically, e-Invoicing will make Compliance simpler & better for Businesses, since the data for GSTR filing as well as e-Way Bills shall be auto-populated, reducing work for Businesses. e-Invoices shall also make ITC claiming simpler & more accurate.

e-Invoicing is the real-time uploading of all the Invoices of all Business Transactions. Meaning no fake, wrong or hidden Invoices, this shall ensure that only accurate & genuine ITC is being claimed by a taxpayer.

e-Invoicing is the real-time uploading of all the Invoices of all Business Transactions. Meaning no fake, wrong or hidden Invoices, this shall ensure that only accurate & genuine ITC is being claimed by a taxpayer.

The e-Invoice usually gets rejected due to an error in the SCHEMA format. Check if you have filled all the mandatory fields in the correct format & try re-uploading the invoice.

No, you have to cancel that e-Invoice & recreate one for the later date

Yes, all export invoices need to be reported to the IRP.

The e-Invoicing data shall be available on the IRP for 24 hours from the time of generation.

No, there are many ways to report your e-Invoices on the IRP, some of them are-

• APIs
• SMS
• Mobile App
• Offline Utility tools
• Through GSPs

No, there is only one format SCHEMA for all Invoices in the new e-Invoicing system all the invoices shall be generated in the same format.

Yes, the format will look like this- FORMAT

Yes, the IRP will check the authenticity of the Invoice by also validating the GSTIN of the Recipient.

In such cases, you can always create a Credit Note for that Invoice to nullify it if there has been no actual transaction against the Invoice.

You must declare the Credit Note in your GSTR-1 & GSTR-3B filing very carefully.

No, you cannot upload the Invoice for a future date. However you can upload your invoices in real-time in the IRP, in other words, Invoices can be uploaded to the IRP for a very near future date, such as 24-48 hours.

No, you need not generate e-Invoices if your Turnover is less than Rs. 100 Crores.

Yes, although it is said that the e-Invoice data shall be transferred to the e-Way Bill Portal & create Part-A of the e-Way Bill, you still have to furnish the other half, that is Part-B of the e-Way Bill. Also, Part A shall be updated only if it passes all validations required by e-Way Bill Portal. In case such validation fails, the user will manuulay have to create the e-Way bill.

You have to enter the Vehicle & Transporter details in the e-Way Bill.

e-Invoicing is linked to the e-Way Bill System as the IRP will distribute the e-Invoice data to the e-Way Bill Portal wherever the e-Way Bill is required.

From this data, Part-A of the e-Way Bill will be auto-generated, & you will only have to furnish the details of Part-B.

e-Invoicing is linked to GST Return Filing in two ways.

As it is expected that on the implementation of the New GST Return Filing System, the e-Invoice data will automatically be shared with the GST Portal as well as with the Recipient of goods/services.

Recipients can use this invoice data to take action on Invoice in real-time.

Whereas, GST Portal will auto-populate the e-Invoice details in Annexure-1 of the Supplier.

No, you will have to auto-populate the Part-B of the e-Way Bill manually since it contains the details of the Vehicle & the Transporter.

The B2C QR code contains a link to a URL through which the buyer is navigated to the digital display that indicates the payment status of their bill/invoice.

In e-Invoicing, there are a total of two QR Codes- the B2B QR Codes & the B2C QR Codes. Both of these contain different information and details depending on the type of Recipient- if they are registered on unregistered.

The Invoice Registration Portal uses your Mail ID & Mobile Number given in your GST Portal. If you wish to change it on the Invoice Registration Portal you may as well change it in the GST Portal first, from there it will auto-update in the IRP.

The e-Invoicing will help recipients of the goods in the following way-

The New GST Return System will roll out along with the e-Invoicing system. In the New GST Return system, the Inward supply form for the recipient is called Anx-2 which is the replacement of GSTR-2A. But unlike GSTR-2A, Anx-2 requires some actions from the buyer's end, and this can take some time.

But with e-Invoicing, Suppliers Anx-1 will be furnished accurately

e-Invoicing will help the banks to verify the value or worthiness of an MSME through their transactional activities. This fastens the process & makes it simple for the banks to grant loans to MSMEs.

e-Invoicing will curb tax evasion by bringing transparency to the system. With the authentication of Invoices in real-time as soon as they are created, on a unified portal, the process becomes much more transparent & systematic.

Such a system reduces the chances of bogus invoices or transactions eventually rooting out tax evasion completely, if the system is successfully implemented.

As of now, this cannot be said that e-Invoicing can replace e-Way Bills. But in the future, the government may re-think keeping both the system that serves the same purpose- tax evasion.

e-Invoicing works on a more basic level of invoicing whereas e-Way Bills work as a filter later while the actual transportation of goods.

So it may be good to have both systems in place.

e-Invoicing is linked to the e-Way Bill System as the IRP will distribute the e-Invoice data to the e-Way Bill Portal wherever the e-Way Bill is required.

From this data, Part-A of the e-Way Bill will auto-generate, & you will only have to furnish the details of Part-B.

e-Invoicing is linked to GST Return Filing in two ways.

It is expected that on the implementation of the New GST Return Filing System, the e-Invoice data will automatically be shared with the GST Portal as well as with the Recipient of goods/services.

Recipients can use this invoice data to take action on Invoice in real-time.

Whereas, GST Portal will auto-populate the e-Invoice details in Annexure-1 of the taxpayer.

No, you will have to auto-populate the Part-B of the e-Way Bill manually since it contains the details of the Vehicle & the Transporter.

The B2C QR code contains a link to a URL through which the buyer is navigated to the digital display that indicates the payment status of their bill/invoice.

In e-Invoicing, there are a total of two QR Codes- the B2B QR Codes & the B2C QR Codes. Both of these contain different information and details depending on the type of Recipient- whether they are registered on unregistered.

The Invoice Registration Portal uses your Mail ID & Mobile Number given in your GST Portal. If you wish to change it on the Invoice Registration Portal you may as well change it in the GST Portal first, from there it will auto-update in the IRP.

The e-Invoicing will help recipients of the goods in the following way-

The New GST Return System will roll out along with the e-Invoicing system. In the New GST Return system, the Inward supply form for the recipient is called Anx-2 which is the replacement of GSTR-2A. But unlike GSTR-2A, Anx-2 requires some actions from the buyer's end, and this can take some time.

But with e-Invoicing, Suppliers Anx-1 will be furnished accurately

Yes, a Foreign Service Provider can integrate with the IRP, but only within the shores of India.

It is optional to sign the JSON before submitting the file.

Non-tax invoices are challans or the Bill of Supplies. These documents need not be reported to the IRP.

Yes, IRN will be generated for ISD Invoices & ISD Credit Notes as they are issued by Input Service Distributors.

The IRP will validate an e-Invoice for GSTIN, Financial Year, Invoice Number, Mandatory Fields, etc.