In order to curb Goods and Services Tax (GST) evasion through issue of fake invoices, all invoices for business-to-business sales by entities beyond a specified turnover threshold will be generated on a centralised government portal by September. The move would also make the returns filing process simpler for businesses as invoice data would already be captured by a centralised portal. The revenue secretary is monitoring the progress of implementation of electronic or e-invoice project for which an officers' committee has already been set up.
E-invoice for B2B transactions will be rolled out in next three-four months in a phased manner. Once rolled out, the e-invoice project will allow businesses to simultaneously generate e-way bill. E-way bill is required for moving goods worth more than Rs 50,000 from one place to another. Depending on the success of the project in the B2B segment, the revenue department would be looking at extending it to business-to-consumer (B2C) sales, especially in sectors where the probability of tax evasion is high.
Businesses beyond the specified turnover threshold, to be decided later, would be provided a software which will be linked to the GST Network (GSTN) or a government portal for generating e-invoice. The threshold can also be fixed on the basis of the value of invoice. The e-invoice generation method will be similar to the one being followed for e-way bill on the 'ewaybill.nic.in' portal or payment of GST on the GSTN portal.