Without invoices, businesses are left in the lurch

As the deadline for tax filing is fast approaching, many businesses in Ho Chi Minh City startle to find printing houses haven’t done printing their invoices.

Last May, in a move to simplify procedures, the government decided to shift the task of printing invoices from the Ministry of Finance to businesses themselves.

Three months later, the Ministry of Finance issued a guideline explaining how businesses could go about printing their own invoices or better yet, use electronic invoices.

Now, less than a week before all businesses must inform local tax authorities of their new invoice forms before filing for tax, many find out their printing houses are too overloaded with other businesses’ invoices to print their own.

An accountant at gasoline supplier Petrolimex Binh Thuan said he had only received 600 out of the 2,500 invoice books he ordered from Lien Son Printing House at the end of last year.

“I’ve traveled many times from Binh Thuan Province to Ho Chi Minh City to ask for my invoices,” he said. “I got only promises.”

Another accountant for an asphalt manufacturer who wanted to be known as T., told Tuoi Tre her company placed an order at Tai Chinh Printing House last December and Tai Chinh promised to deliver her invoices in January.

By now, however, Tai Chinh hasn’t delivered anything and can’t even say when it can. T. said she had gone to the local tax bureau asking to buy invoices but was told, “Sort it out with your printing house.”

Printing houses cite overload, a long Lunar New Year holiday, and a shortage of employees after the Lunar New Year as reasons why they are defaulting on invoice orders.

Some are taking advantage of the situation by charging high prices.

The HCM City Printing Association and two major printing houses, Lien Son and Nguyen Xuong Thinh, have asked the central Tax Authority as well as the municipal tax bureau to continue selling invoices to businesses in the second quarter of this year.

However, Le Thi Thu Huong, Vice Director of the HCM City Tax Bureau told Tuoi Tre she hadn’t heard any change of plan from the higher tax authority.

Huong said 6 months had passed since the finance ministry issued the guideline so businesses did have plenty of time to prepare.

A total 81 printing houses had registered with her bureau to handle the task so there wasn’t any reason why businesses should all flock to big printing houses that are already overloaded, she said.