Electronic Fiscalisation (EFI) in Montenegro

Obligors are (1) natural persons liable to personal income tax who must issue invoices (entrepreneurs), (2) legal entities liable to corporate income tax who must issue invoices (d.o.o. etc.) and (3) taxpayers selling goods or services through self-service machines — Art. 4 of the Fiscalisation Law. Fiscalisation covers both cash and non-cash payments (Art. 1–2). Not obligors (Art. 5): sale of tickets/tokens in scheduled passenger transport, sale of own agricultural products at market stalls, purchase of agricultural products by VAT payers, universal postal services, banking and insurance, payments for games of chance, sales on board the national air carrier. Mixed activities are exempt only for the Art. 5 activities (Art. 6).

The obligor must use a certificate for electronic signature issued by a certification service provider under the e-signature regulations to sign fiscal invoices and to authenticate in the exchange with the Tax Administration (Art. 10 para. 2–3). The certificate (or a soft certificate) is installed on the electronic payment device (ENU) — hardware with software that creates, sends and receives fiscal-invoice messages (Art. 3 item 8).

Before using the fiscal service the obligor electronically submits data on each business premises separately, at least 24 hours before it starts issuing fiscal invoices (Art. 14 para. 1). Data: TIN, geolocation, address, type of premises (incl. online shop and mobile premises), activity code, working hours and days, start date, temporary closures, end date, floor area, payment mode (cash/non-cash), status, owned or rented (Art. 14 para. 2). The Tax Administration generates a unique premises code. Any change (closure, new premises, change of activity) is reported at least 5 days before it occurs (Art. 14 para. 6). Registration is done on the Self-service EFI Portal (SEP): https://sep.tax.gov.me/self-care (test environment: https://efitest.tax.gov.me/self-care).

For every person issuing invoices the obligor assigns an operator code, links it to that person's JMB and reports it to the Tax Administration (Art. 8). Before using the fiscal service it also reports the software producer and maintainer: name, seat, TIN, software name and the unique producer/maintainer code assigned by the Tax Administration (Art. 15–16). The software must embed the producer code and must not allow non-issuance of invoices or avoidance of fiscalisation (Art. 11 para. 1, Art. 15 para. 4).

Before going live the obligor is given the possibility to test the fiscal service (Art. 11 para. 2; test SEP portal). Every fiscal invoice is signed electronically and sent to the Tax Administration in real time; the Tax Administration returns the unique invoice code (JIKR), which is printed on the invoice together with the obligor's code (IKOF) (Art. 12–13). Besides the VAT data, a fiscal invoice contains: invoice number (invoice / premises / year / ENU), hour and minute, operator code, IKOF, JIKR, payment method (cash, card, bank transfer, other), payment due date if not paid immediately, and the buyer's TIN for B2B / non-cash transactions (Art. 7 and 9). At the start of each working day the cash deposit per ENU is reported to the Tax Administration (Art. 12 para. 2). Cancellation and refund invoices are fiscalised too (Art. 21). A notice on the obligation to issue and take an invoice must be visibly displayed at every point of sale (Art. 32 para. 9 of the VAT Law).

Temporary internet outage: invoices are issued without a JIKR (IKOF only); the obligor must restore the connection and send them within 2 days, otherwise notify the Tax Administration (Art. 17). Fiscal service failure: invoices are recorded in an invoice book previously certified by the Tax Administration; within 5 days the service must be restored or the Tax Administration notified on the prescribed form, and the invoices sent electronically within the same period (Art. 18). Areas without internet coverage: the obligor works in off-line mode with a certificate from the Agency for Electronic Communications on unavailability of internet (issued within 30 days, valid one year, renewable) and delivers the invoices to the Tax Administration by the 10th of the month for the previous month (Art. 19–20).