The word “e” is an interesting one. For a fruit vendor running his shop at the corner of the road, an invoice generated from MS Word vs. the manual one on a paper is an e-invoice, and for a small business owner who has just started using a free accounting software, an invoice from that system vs. the one from the MS Word is an e-invoice.
Now as we have touched upon various angles through which an e invoice can be perceived, its important to understand what an e invoice is from GAZT lens and that brings us to our 1st point : the definition of e-invoice as per the GAZT regulations.
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1. What exactly is an e-invoice?
According to the GAZT regulations, “the electronic invoice is defined as an invoice generated, stored, and amended in a structured electronic format through an electronic solution, which includes all the requirements of a tax invoice. A handwritten or scanned invoice is not considered an Electronic Invoice”.
Language Used for e-invoice
XML (e Extensible Markup Language), the primary purpose of which is the transportation of data in both machine-readable and human-readable format, is the language in which these e-invoices will be created as per the GAZT.
After familiarizing ourselves with the definition of e-invoice as per GAZT, the characteristics of an e-invoice and the electronic language used to generate an e-invoice, let us now move on to our 2nd most important point regarding the implementation of e-invoicing: i.e., the relevant standards required to be met for an e-invoice as per the GAZT.
2. Relevant standards for E–Invoice
There are global standards that are generally used for e-invoicing and GAZT has also referred to the same.
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It is important to understand here which rules takes precedence over the others as mentioned below.
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Now that we have understood the definition of e-invoice, the characteristics of e-invoice and the required standards, the question now is how to move forward. In this context, the 3rd most important item to be known is: the right approach that must be followed for handling the implementation of the e-invoicing project.
3. How to Approach the project
Following is our recommended approach for the successful implementation of the e-invoicing as per the GAZT regulations.
![](https://hyphenconsultancy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/e-invoice-ksa-1024x576.png)
Following are the timelines for the complete implementation of the e-invoicing throughout the KSA.
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