11–18 of 18 posts
I'm confused - an invoice is just a statement of what is owed. It isn't a formal legal document. So I'm not sure what their setup has to do with it, or what you mean by "has zero legal value"?
It's not your problem. There is exactly one thing your company can do (which defeats the whole purpose): open a branch office in their country and employ them as a regular role.
If you're not doing that, how they issue you an invoice is irrelevant to you.
I'm confused - an invoice is just a statement of what is owed. It isn't a formal legal document. So I'm not sure what their setup has to do with it, or what you mean by "has zero legal value"?
In all EU countries an invoice (tax receipt) is a legal document very exactly specified by local law as well as EU regulation, and you can't move a cent without it - you won't be able to claim the expense (subtract from tax base = pay income tax on profit only) if you don't have it.
Have we been doing it completely wrong this whole time...?
VAT taxes and such are the responsibility of the seller, not the buyer. Your freelancers can make their invoices in Excel or Pages, send them to you and you pay. There is no reason that there would be an issue. Sometimes a company has accountants who are lacking and only know how to do one thing, unwilling to learn. I highly doubt his/her claims that all invoices have to come from a registered business entity. But for these kind of questions you need to tell which country you're to get the most precise answers.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all EU countries an invoice (tax receipt) is a legal document very exactly specified by local law as well as EU regulation, and you can't move a cent without it - you won't be able to claim the expense (subtract from tax base = pay income tax on profit only) if you don't have it.
I'm an American working for an Italian company as a freelancer, and I just print a generic invoice from Harvest (time tracker). I've also seen us pay other freelancers who make simple PDF invoices from web templates. Have we been doing it completely wrong this whole time...?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm an American working for an Italian company as a freelancer, and I just print a generic invoice from Harvest (time tracker). I've also seen us pay other freelancers who make simple PDF invoices from web templates. Have we been doing it completely wrong this whole time...?
No, you haven't done anything wrong. Some people are just paranoid-compliant to the maximum level. Unless a company is doing actual money laundering or financing terrorists, the tax auditors won't give a damn about some wrongly formatted invoices from freelancers, as long as they are based on reality.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, you haven't done anything wrong. Some people are just paranoid-compliant to the maximum level. Unless a company is doing actual money laundering or financing terrorists, the tax auditors won't give a damn about some wrongly formatted invoices from freelancers, as long as they are based on reality.
Ok, phew, thanks for the reality check! We don't finance any terrorism (unless you count the quality of my code). We're just a small company without a big legal/accounting dept.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all EU countries an invoice (tax receipt) is a legal document very exactly specified by local law as well as EU regulation, and you can't move a cent without it - you won't be able to claim the expense (subtract from tax base = pay income tax on profit only) if you don't have it.
I'm an American working for an Italian company as a freelancer, and I just print a generic invoice from Harvest (time tracker). I've also seen us pay other freelancers who make simple PDF invoices from web templates. Have we been doing it completely wrong this whole time...?