The Government had in December 2019 prescribed that the GST Taxpayers having aggregate annual turnover more than Rs. 100 crores in any preceding Financial Year will be required to issue e-invoice for all the Business to Business (B2B) supplies, in the manner prescribed under rule 48(4) of the CGST Rules, 2017 w.e.f. 1st April 2020.
Further, it was also mandated under rule 48(5) of the CGST Rules, 2017 that a B2B invoice or an export invoice issued by such a taxpayer, in any other manner, shall not be treated as an invoice.
In March 2020, the date of implementation of e-invoice was extended to 1st October 2020. Keeping in view the hardships faced by the taxpayers due to COVID-19 lockdown, in July 2020, it was further prescribed that the taxpayers having aggregate turnover of Rs. 500 Cr. and above only would be required to issue e-invoice w.e.f. 1st October 2020.
Now, even after more than 9 months of the first notification in this regard, some of the taxpayers having aggregate turnover of Rs. 500 Cr. and above are still not ready.
Accordingly, as a last chance, in the initial phase of implementation of e-invoice, it has been decided that the invoices issued by such taxpayers during October 2020 without following the manner prescribed under rule 48(4), shall be deemed to be valid and the penalty leviable under section 122 of the CGST Act, 2017, for such non adherence to provisions, shall stand waived if the Invoice Reference Number (IRN) for such invoices is obtained from the Invoice Reference Portal (IRP) within 30 days of date of invoice.
Thus, penalty has been waived with a condition that IRN for invoice issued between 01.10.2020 to 31.10.2020 is generated within 30 days of invoice. Thus, for invoice issued on 01.10.2020 last date for generating IRN without penalty would be 31.10.2020.
It may be noted that no such relaxation would be available for the invoices issued from 1st November 2020 and such invoices issued in violation of rule 48(4) of the CGST Rules 2017 would not be valid and all the applicable provisions of CGST Act and Rules would apply for the said violation.
Rule 48(4) of the CGST rules is as under:
“(4) The invoice shall be prepared by such class of registered persons as may be notified by the Government, on the recommendations of the Council, by including such particulars contained in FORM GST INV-01 after obtaining an Invoice Reference Number by uploading information contained therein on the Common Goods and Services Tax Electronic Portal in such manner and subject to such conditions and restrictions as may be specified in the notification.”
Section 122 of the CGST act:
Penalty u/s 122 has been prescribed at Rs. 10,000.
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