Invoice PDFs that cite South African law in NG and KE
Why an invoice PDF from a Nigerian or Kenyan Achekam workspace can be headed TAX INVOICE and cite South African law, and what to do before sending one.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Running a business businesses in Nigeria, Kenya
A customer in Nairobi forwards your invoice to their finance team, and the reply comes back puzzled: why does a Kenyan supplier's invoice quote South Africa's VAT Act? Or a Lagos start-up that has not registered for VAT sends its first invoice and notices, too late, that it is headed TAX INVOICE.
Both can happen with one particular PDF in Achekam. This article explains which document is affected, which documents are not, and the simple checks that stop an awkward invoice reaching a customer.
The invoice-screen PDF and its fixed heading
An issued invoice can be downloaded as a PDF on your letterhead, or e-mailed straight from the invoice, with or without a pay link. If the e-mail fails, Achekam reports it as not sent rather than pretending it went.
The PDF made this way, from the invoice screen, has a known defect. It is always headed TAX INVOICE and cites the South African VAT Act, whatever your country and whether or not you have a VAT number. That PDF is made in your browser, and the browser-made version is where the defect lies.
Nothing in your books is affected. The invoice's amounts, tax codes and posting are what you entered. The problem is the wording on the page your customer reads.
Documents the server makes follow your country
The defect sits in the browser-made PDF only. Documents that Achekam's server produces from its own template handle the heading correctly: they follow your business's settings rather than a fixed South African design.
That distinction is worth knowing when a customer asks for a copy. If a document comes from the server, its heading reflects your setup. If it comes from the invoice screen's download or e-mail button, read the heading before it goes.
Tax Invoice only when a VAT number is set
Your VAT registration number belongs in Settings, under Firm Profile. Documents made by the server print that number and are titled Tax Invoice only when a VAT number has been entered. Without one, they are not presented as tax invoices.
This matters most for businesses outside VAT. In Nigeria, a small business is exempt from registering for, charging and filing VAT unless it opts in; many Kenyan businesses below the registration threshold are in a similar position. For them, an invoice headed TAX INVOICE overstates their status. Keep the VAT number field empty until you are registered, and enter it on the day registration takes effect.
A related point concerns your customers' numbers. A customer's tax number prints as a VAT number only when it looks like a South African VAT number; a Nigerian Tax ID or a KRA PIN prints as a "tax number". That is accurate, if a little cautious, and worth explaining if a customer asks why their VAT number is labelled differently.
The Accounting invoice form follows your tax codes
Two forms create invoices in Achekam, and only one follows your country. The invoice form under Accounting uses your country's tax codes once the pack is activated: standard, zero-rated, exempt, out of scope or reverse charge, with VAT on standard lines only.
The New invoice form under Billing & Finance offers only 15% or 0% VAT and shows rand, so it does not follow Nigerian or Kenyan VAT at all. Raise every invoice from the Accounting form. A correct invoice with an imperfect PDF heading is a printing problem; an invoice raised on the wrong form is an accounting problem.
Fiscal identifiers once an invoice is fiscalised
In both countries, the invoice that counts for the tax authority is increasingly the electronic one. In Kenya, every business must issue electronic tax invoices through KRA's eTIMS under section 23A of the Tax Procedures Act; in Nigeria, invoices are fiscalised through the NRS's Merchant Buyer Solution.
Achekam prints eTIMS or MBS identifiers on an invoice only once that invoice has been fiscalised. Until then, the document says it is not yet fiscalised. So a Kenyan or Nigerian customer can always tell from the page whether the invoice they hold has been through the authority's system. Kenya's Tax Procedures (Electronic Tax Invoice) Regulations set out who must issue electronic tax invoices, what an invoice must contain, and how invoices are transmitted to KRA.
Checking a sample before you send
Before you send invoices to customers from a Nigerian or Kenyan workspace, run one test:
- Raise a small invoice on the Accounting form to a test customer you control.
- Download the PDF from the invoice screen and read the heading and the footer.
- Check whether your VAT number appears, and whether it should.
- Check how the customer's tax number is labelled.
- Look for the fiscalisation line, if e-invoicing applies to you.
If the heading or the legal reference is wrong for your situation, decide how you will handle it until the defect is fixed. Options include a line in your covering e-mail explaining that the heading is a system default and naming the law that actually applies to you, or agreeing with your accountant on the documents to send to customers who query it. What you should not do is let a TAX INVOICE heading go out unexplained from a business that is not registered for VAT.
Other places where South African assumptions still show are listed in screens that still assume South Africa. For what your own tax identifier should look like on an invoice, see your Tax ID on Nigerian invoices, and for the separate refusal that can stop a standard-rated line, read charging VAT while rates await approval. Run the five-step test today, before the next invoice leaves.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
