ZATCA E-Invoicing Phase 2 Readiness in Saudi Arabia
Your invoice data, VAT treatments and workflows ready for Fatoora integration before your wave date arrives.
ZATCA E-Invoicing overview
Phase 2 of ZATCA e-invoicing connects your invoicing system to the Fatoora platform. Standard tax invoices to businesses must be cleared by ZATCA before they reach the buyer, and simplified invoices to consumers must be reported within 24 hours. ZATCA brings businesses in by wave, based on turnover, and notifies each one ahead of its date. Wave 25 covers resident businesses with taxable turnover above SAR 187,500 and starts on 1 February 2027.
Most integration problems are not technical. They come from customer records without VAT numbers or national addresses, products with the wrong VAT treatment, credit notes that do not reference the original invoice, and branches that each invoice in their own way. Your solution provider connects the system, but if the data going through it is wrong, invoices are rejected or cleared with errors that end up in your VAT return.
We prepare your business for integration and keep it clean afterwards. We confirm your wave, review every invoice flow across Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam or wherever you trade, clean the master data, map each VAT treatment and test sample invoices with your provider. After go-live we reconcile cleared and reported invoices to your ledger every month. We do not certify or onboard solutions with ZATCA; your provider does.
Prefer to talk it through first? Call +971 54 542 4854 or email info@hof-partners.com.
What e-invoicing readiness includes
- Wave check
- Your VAT sales from 2022 to 2025 checked against ZATCA's published wave rules, so you know your connection date.
- Invoice flow review
- Every way you bill mapped: business and consumer invoices, credit and debit notes, branches, and point of sale.
- Customer and product data
- Customer VAT numbers, national addresses, and product records corrected before they ever reach Fatoora.
- VAT treatment mapping
- Standard, zero-rated, exempt, and out-of-scope sales set to the right tax category and reason in your system.
- Test support
- Sample invoices of every type tested with your software provider, with each rejection traced to its cause.
- Monthly reconciliation
- After go-live, invoices ZATCA received matched to your books and your VAT return at the end of every month.
Your invoices clear the first time, because the data behind them is right.
Questions about ZATCA E-Invoicing
ZATCA publishes the turnover criteria for each wave and notifies the businesses it covers. Wave 25 applies to resident businesses whose taxable turnover exceeded SAR 187,500 in 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025, with integration from 1 February 2027. If you are not sure, we check your VAT returns for those years against the published criteria. See the Phase 2 guide.
No. Integration and onboarding, including the cryptographic stamp for each invoicing unit, are done by your solution provider through ZATCA's process. We make sure your data, VAT treatments and workflows are ready for it, take part in testing and check the results after go-live.
Standard tax invoices to business and government customers are sent to ZATCA for clearance before you share them with the buyer. Simplified tax invoices for consumer sales are issued first and reported to ZATCA within 24 hours. Most businesses issue both, so both workflows need to work.
No. Phase 1 covers generating compliant electronic invoices. Phase 2 adds integration: invoices in the required XML format, a cryptographic stamp, and clearance or reporting through Fatoora. Phase 1 compliance is the starting point, not the finish.
ZATCA receives your invoice data in real time or within 24 hours, so your VAT return should agree with what Fatoora already holds. We reconcile the two each month and resolve differences before the return is prepared. See our Saudi VAT services.
You'd be issuing invoices that don't meet ZATCA's rules, which can lead to penalties. ZATCA's published e-invoicing penalties start with a warning for some violations and go up to SAR 50,000 for repeated or serious ones, such as not issuing e-invoices. It's far cheaper to start preparing a few months before your date.
At least six years from the end of the tax period they belong to, and they must be stored in Saudi Arabia. Your e-invoicing software should do this, and we check it's set up during testing.
More ways we can help
All services- VAT ServicesRegistration assessed against the SAR 375,000 threshold, then every VAT return prepared from reconciled books.
- Zakat ServicesYour Zakat base calculated from year-end figures and the return prepared well inside ZATCA's 120-day window.
- Qawaem FilingYear-end financial statements prepared, mapped to XBRL and ready to upload to Qawaem within six months.
- Payroll ServicesMonthly payroll prepared with GOSI contributions, a Mudad wage file and end-of-service provisions that add up.
Talk to us about ZATCA e-invoicing
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