Additional instructions – simplified invoices

On 20 October 2020 on the website of the Ministry of Finance they published tax instructions issued by the Minister of Finance on 16 October 2020 within the scope of fiscal receipts regarded as simplified invoices.

In the instructions issued the Minister of Finance systematized the stance within the scope of simplified invoice numbers. As tax payers did not know whether a simplified invoice number could be a receipt number or any other number present on a receipt with NIP (Tax Identification Number) up to PLN 450.00 (EUR 100.00).

In the opinion of the Ministry, in the case of fiscal receipts, it is the fiscal receipt number that is a subsequent number in a series and it explicitly identifies a receipt with NIP up to the amount of PLN 450 as a simplified invoice.

The instructions also contained the discussion of another controversial matter referring to the issuance of standard invoices to receipts which are simplified invoices. The Minister of Finance concluded that in the case of documenting sales with a receipt fulfilling the requirements intended for a simplified invoice, one should not issue another so-called standard invoice by virtue of this sale for the purchaser.  

The presented stance is surely problematic for tax payers as from January 2021 receipts which are simplified invoices will have to be disclosed in the file JPK_VAT as separate invoices, i.e. not as invoices to receipts, which will entail manual calculation of fiscal sales to the VAT register. Furthermore, simplified invoices will also have to be designated with GTU (groups of goods and services) symbols and procedure symbols.

All that remains is to hope that the stance of the Minister of Finance shall change, if only in consideration of the clarity of settlements.