Invoices and documents of expenses for meals and reception of guests need to be properly noted in order to be included in deductible expenses when determining corporate income tax liability.

Legal grounds:

• Circular No. 39/2014/TT-BTC;
• Circular No. 32/2011/TT-BTC;
• Official Dispatch No. 15176/CTHN-TTHT dated May 11, 2021 of Hanoi Tax Department.

Currently, some restaurants issue invoices for food services with the content “food service”. Although the provision of services actually takes place, recording the name of goods and services on the invoice in a general way “food and beverage service” is not in accordance with the law, and the customer when accounting payment of this invoice is subject to tax risks.

1. For paper invoices

Pursuant to Clause 2, Article 19 of Circular No. 39/2014/TT-BTC as follows:

Article 19. Making invoices when the list of goods and services is more than the number of lines of invoice

2. The seller may use the list to list the types of goods and services sold along with the invoice.

…

b) Contents on the list

The list is designed by the seller in accordance with the characteristics, designs, and types of the goods but must ensure the following main contents:

+ Seller name, contact address, tax code

+ Product name, quantity, unit price, amount. In case the seller pays value-added tax using the deduction method, the statement must have the criteria “value-added tax rate” and “value-added tax amount”. Total payment (excluding value-added tax) corresponds to the amount stated on the value-added invoice.

According to the above regulations, if the type of goods is more than the number of lines in the paper invoice, the seller must make a list of the types of goods sold.

Therefore, when providing food and beverage services, if the category of goods/dishes and drinks exceeds the paper invoice page, resulting in the paper invoice having to be recorded as “food and beverage service”, the seller must create List of food and drinks used by customers.

2. For electronic invoices

Pursuant to Article 6 of Circular No. 32/2011/TT-BTC on the content of electronic invoices, it does not stipulate that the seller prepares a list of goods attached to the invoice, but electronic invoices are not limited in number of lines on a paper invoice. Therefore, electronic invoices are capable of fully showing the types of goods purchased and sold on the invoice.

Therefore, for food and beverage services, even though there are many types of dishes and drinks, the seller must fully display all types of dishes on the electronic invoice issued to customers.

In addition, Official Dispatch No. 15176/CTHN-TTHT dated May 11, 2021 of the Hanoi Tax Department has the following instructions:

• In case the input invoice is a paper invoice, the content on the invoice shall comply with the provisions of Article 4 of Circular No. 39/2014/TT-BTC and the attached list on the invoice shall comply with the provisions of Clause 2 Article 19 Circular No. 39/2014/TT-BTC .
• In case the input invoice is an electronic invoice, the content on the invoice shall comply with the provisions of Article 6 of Circular No. 32/2011/TT-BTC and the invoice must fully show the list of goods sold and ensure the principle that information contained in electronic invoices can be accessed and used in complete form when necessary according to the provisions of Clause 3, Article 3 of Circular No. 32/2011/TT-BTC dated March 14/ 2011.