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Thursday, 1 December 2022

Last Night’s Talk Shows: Businesses have two weeks to register for e-invoicing — or face fines

It was a slow night for the talk shows yesterday as we slide into the weekend, with the rollout of the government’s e-invoicing system topping the business news.

A warning to businesses: There are consequences for failing to register to the new e-invoicing system. Those who don’t meet the Tax Authority’s 15 December deadline are at risk of being fined between EGP 20k and EGP 100k, the authority’s director of taxpayer services, Mohsen El Gayar, told Salet El Tahrir (watch, runtime: 3:11). The authority has started preparing a “blacklist” of those who have not yet registered. Those who aren’t in the system by 1 April, 2023 will not be able to claim VAT drawbacks and other tax rebates.

A lot of businesses need to get a move on: Around 1 mn companies will be required to start issuing electronic invoices for B2B and B2C transactions via the government portal from the middle of next month — but only c. 150k companies had registered as of last week.

Refresher- The government is working to digitize all B2B and B2C invoices, a move designed to give the government greater oversight over tax and reduce the size of the informal economy. The Tax Authority launched a pilot in late 2020 and has been gradually extending the system since then. All B2B and B2C invoices across the country are expected to be fully automated by December.

Also on the airwaves last night:

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