Posting Date / Document Date / VAT Periods

Jonathan2708

Hi,

For each invoice in NAV you have a Posting Date and a Document Date, but there is no accounting period or VAT period number. The period the invoice drops into is entirely determined by the Posting Date. We are often asked by potential customers how it copes with late purchase invoices. For instance take the following example :

1. It is April 15th and we have just closed and published the accounts for March
2. We then receive a late purchase invoice dated 30th March

March figures cannot be changed so we cannot use a Posting Date in March, so we use 1st April instead. We set the Document Date to 30th March to record the actual invoice date. However when running our VAT return report for end of March, the VAT due is not reported because the Posting Date is in April. The VAT report works using the Posting Date field. This is not always an issue if the invoice VAT amounts around month end are small, but we have a large potential prospect who deals in very large invoices (VAT could be 100000GBP) which this would be a problem for.

My question is how does other NAV partners/developers address this problem. I understand other localised versions around Europe may have mods in this area? I was considering changing the VAT report/VAT closing routine to use 'Document Date' instead of 'Posting Date'.

Any advice appreciated,

Jonathan

Malajlo

Posting date should be the date when your obligation to partner begins (therefore due date is calculated). VAT Date is (at least in SLovenia...) the date when you recieve invoice. So, if you have to post "late" invoices, block VAT dates in GL Setup but leave posting dates open (or reopen it in such case).
VAT report should work using VAT date, not posting date (or creation date). I think this is in WW version by default.

AdamRoue

The posting date is April 15th, your VAT liability is this date because this is when you received the invoice (I believe ths is a valid argument with the authorities as you did not receive it prior to this date and you closed you period to declare your return - but I do not work in finance). Some clients may want to process this as March 30th to assist in the VAT declaration, and this is not an issue assuming the period is open. The document date is calculated from the posting date, but again clients will alter this, so in the example given if the client referenced the posting date as April 15th they "may" chose to reflect the document date as March 30th, but they may not - it depends - why should the client pay the invoice "early" when it has taken two weeks to arrive at no fault of the business, therefore they may not set the document date appropriately. Alternatively they may reference the posting date as March 30th and calculate the due date manually from the invoice receipt on 15th. I find with most clients they process the invoice how best suites them These are the oddities, some will sort delays out with vendors if it is regular, or change the process to assist with these, of course it also depends upon the value, I find they are less worried by a £10 invoice than a £100,000 invoice