The bill to amend the tax on goods and services and some other laws assumes the introduction of eFaktura. Minister Jan Sarnowski, responsible for drafting the project, looks at its implementation optimistically. The new system will probably start in the new year as a voluntary solution, and from 2023 It'll be mandatory.
- JPK VAT files send every m-c 1,700,000 taxpayers, soon thanks to the effect we will get data about the transaction practically in real time – says Sarnowski. – We receive such data now from online and virtual cash registers. Thanks to STIR, we analyse financial flows on an ongoing basis. It's a digital revolution.
The national e-Facture system is structured, issued and received through the government's IT system. This is different from the electronic invoices already in force, generated internally in the entrepreneur's accounting system and sent by e-mail.
Project objectives
As we read in the draft, it provides for a change Act dated 11 March 2004 on tax on goods and services (Journal of Laws of 2020, item 106, as amended), hereinafter referred to as the ‘VAT Act’, by introducing the possibility to issue structured invoices as one of the accepted forms of documentation of sales, in addition to paper invoices and current economic electronic invoices.
With regard to structured invoices which occur as an electronic invoice, it will be possible to issue and receive them through the electronic system, i.e. National e-Faktur System (KSeF).
It is assumed that the proposed solution will contribute not only to strengthening the control of the regularity of VAT settlement, but also to simplifying the process of clearing accounts with entrepreneurs itself, in view of the possibility for tax authorities to monitor invoiced transactions remotely.
The proposed solution is also expected to increase the revenue of the state budget as a result of the assumed increase in VAT collection at each stage of trade in goods and services.
The proposed solution will allow taxpayers to disseminate a uniform electronic invoice format, in the form of a structured invoice, which will allow further electronic and automated invoicing and accounting of commercial transactions between taxpayers.
Benefits for taxpayers
In KSeF it is the tax administration that provides storage of invoices issued through it. Moreover, for taxable persons issuing only structured invoices and meeting conditions, inter alia, for registration as an active VAT taxable person and for the submission of declarations for each trading period, the proposed law introduces a preference in summary form from 60 days to 45 the date of VAT refund.
Concerns of entrepreneurs
The new system of taxpayers is another control tool, facilitating surveillance of their activities in digital reality. This will also be an additional burden for those entrepreneurs who, together with the invoice, have to provide other documents.
‘If, in fact, the e-invoice system is mandatory for all VAT taxable persons, entrepreneurs will also have to provide other channels/ conditions for the transmission of such information in order to meet the statutory requirements,’ he warns. Polish Confederation Lewiatan.
– This may also apply to traders who are contractually obliged to send, together with the invoice, additional specifications, reception protocols.
The introduction of a mandatory circulation of invoices through e-invoicing will mean a serious ailment on both the buyer's side and the seller's side (various transmission and archiving channels).