Ireland E-Invoicing Mandate 2028: Complete Preparation Guide

Ireland's e-invoicing mandate starts on 1 November 2028. From that date, VAT-registered businesses established in Ireland whose tax affairs are managed by Revenue's Large Corporates Division must issue structured e-invoices, to the European standard EN 16931, to Irish business customers and public bodies, and report each invoice's data to Revenue as it is issued. From the same date, every business in Ireland must be able to receive structured e-invoices. Revenue set out the plan in October 2025 and restated it in July 2026. On 19 October 2026 the Government published the Finance (No. 2) Bill 2026, which writes it into the VAT Consolidation Act 2010. The Bill is not yet law and can still be amended as it passes through the Oireachtas.

The rollout follows three phases:

Phase 1 (1 November 2028): large corporates, meaning businesses whose tax affairs Revenue's Large Corporates Division manages, start sending structured e-invoices for domestic B2B sales and reporting them in real time. Revenue writes to each one to confirm it is in scope. All businesses, whatever their size, must be able to receive structured e-invoices.
Phase 2 (1 November 2029): Revenue describes this phase as extending the domestic obligation to VAT-registered businesses in cross-border EU B2B trade that benefit from the zero rate. The Bill as drafted reaches further: it also takes in any business established in Ireland that buys goods or reverse-charge services from suppliers in other EU countries, and businesses the Large Corporates Division handled on 1 January 2028.
Phase 3 (1 July 2030): the EU's VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA) rules apply to cross-border B2B trade in every Member State, with structured e-invoices and digital reporting for intra-EU sales.

A business that trades only within Ireland and is not a Large Corporates Division case has no date yet for sending. Revenue says the obligation will "eventually" cover all VAT-registered businesses, and the Bill lets any business issue structured e-invoices voluntarily in the meantime.

The obligation that reaches every business in 2028 is the receiving one. Revenue states it on its Phase One page for large corporates: "From 1 November 2028, all businesses in Ireland are required to be able to receive structured eInvoices." Under the Bill, a supplier in scope does not need your agreement to send you one, and you must give it your VAT number when asked. A sole trader who buys from a large Irish supplier is affected from the first day.

Sales to consumers are outside the mandate: the Bill's sending obligation covers supplies to businesses and public bodies.

This guide sets out who is in each phase, what the Bill requires, what changes when PDFs stop counting, how Ireland compares with other EU mandates, what is known about penalties, and the practical steps to take now.

The Three-Phase Rollout: Who Must Comply and When

Phase 1: November 2028

Phase 1 is not set by turnover. Revenue defines a large corporate as "a VAT-registered business whose tax affairs are managed by Large Corporates Division in Revenue and established, or have a fixed establishment, in Ireland". The Bill fixes the date that counts: a business is in Phase 1 if the Large Corporates Division administered its tax affairs on 1 January 2027. Revenue said in February 2026 that it would write to large corporates to confirm their inclusion, and its implementation document expects the phase to "affect a small number of businesses".

A Phase 1 business must issue a structured e-invoice for each supply to a business established in Ireland or to a public body, and transmit the invoice's data to Revenue at the time of issue. Its customers, whatever their size, must be ready to receive those invoices from the first day.

Phase 2: November 2029

Revenue's VAT Modernisation Timeline says that in Phase 2 "the domestic obligation will extend to VAT registered businesses who engage in cross border EU B2B trade, subject to Zero rate VAT arrangements". In practice, that means businesses selling goods or services at the zero rate to VAT-registered customers in other EU countries. The obligation they take on is the domestic one: structured e-invoices and real-time reporting for their sales within Ireland.

The Bill's wording is wider. From 1 November 2029, its new section 66A also applies to a business established in Ireland that "engages in an intra-Community acquisition of goods, an intra-Community acquisition of services, an intra-Community supply of goods or an intra-Community supply of services". Acquisitions are purchases: goods bought from a supplier in another Member State, and services bought from an EU supplier where the Irish business accounts for the VAT under the reverse charge. As drafted, a business that only buys from EU suppliers, a software subscription from a supplier established in another Member State for example, would be in Phase 2. The Bill also adds businesses that the Large Corporates Division handled on 1 January 2028. Bills can change at Committee Stage, so the practical step now is to check whether you make or receive any intra-EU supplies and to follow the final text.

Most Irish businesses are small. According to Ireland's Central Statistics Office, there were 401,359 active enterprises in Ireland in 2023, with 92.6% classified as micro enterprises employing fewer than 10 people. For one of those that buys and sells only within Ireland, the dated obligation is receiving from November 2028. Its date for sending has not been set.

For accountants and bookkeepers, the first job is sorting clients by phase: which are Large Corporates Division cases, which sell to or buy from businesses in other EU countries, and which trade only domestically.

Phase 3: July 2030

From 1 July 2030, the ViDA Directive, adopted on 11 March 2025, applies to cross-border B2B trade in every Member State. According to Revenue's implementation document, suppliers must then issue e-invoices for intra-EU B2B transactions within 10 days of the transaction and report specified data digitally to their national tax authority, and the new reporting replaces the VIES returns. Phase 1 and Phase 2 businesses will already be issuing structured e-invoices at home by then. Phase 3 adds the cross-border invoice and its reporting for every business that trades with other EU countries.

Who Is Leading Implementation

Revenue is directing the rollout and working with the Office of Government Procurement (OGP), Ireland's Peppol authority. Its implementation document says the new system "will utilise various existing technical infrastructures", including the Peppol framework that some Irish public sector bodies have used for B2G e-invoicing since 2019, and that Revenue will consult industry experts on the mechanisms for e-invoicing and reporting. Neither Revenue's 2026 pages nor the Bill name Peppol as the required channel. The Bill leaves the data Revenue will require, and how it is to be transmitted, to regulations that had not been published by October 2026.

What the Finance (No. 2) Bill 2026 Says

The Finance (No. 2) Bill 2026 was initiated in Dáil Éireann on 19 October 2026. Its section 51 inserts a new section 66A (invoices in structured electronic format) and a new Chapter 6A with section 83A (digital reporting) into the VAT Consolidation Act 2010, both effective from 1 November 2028. The points below follow the Bill as initiated. Amendments are possible before it is enacted.

Who Must Issue, and to Whom

The Bill calls a business in scope a "specified person": the Large Corporates Division cases from 1 November 2028, joined by the Phase 2 groups from 1 November 2029. A specified person must issue a structured e-invoice for each taxable supply within the State to a business established in Ireland or to a public body, so the mandate covers B2G as well as B2B. Any other VAT-registered business may issue structured e-invoices to the same customers voluntarily.

"Structured electronic format" means a format that complies with the European standard EN 16931 and one of the syntaxes listed under the EU's 2014 e-invoicing directive, which are UBL and CII. The detailed particulars each invoice must carry will be set by regulations.

What Changes on the Invoice

Your customer's identification number. Each structured e-invoice must show the customer's VAT number. Where the customer is a business or public body that is not VAT-registered, Revenue will assign it a tax reference number for the purpose. A customer must provide the number to the supplier on request.
Monthly summary invoices. Instead of one invoice per supply, a business may issue a single structured summary invoice covering supplies to a customer that become chargeable in the same calendar month.
Credit notes and debit notes. When a structured e-invoice is amended by a credit note, debit note or replacement invoice, that document must be issued in the same structured format as the original.
No consent needed. Issuing an invoice in structured format "shall not be subject to the prior agreement" of the person receiving it. A customer cannot insist on a PDF instead.

What Receivers Must Do

The Bill puts duties on the receiving side too. A business that issues or receives a structured e-invoice must apply business controls that ensure the authenticity of its origin, the integrity of its content, a reliable audit trail linking it to the supply, and that it is "issued, received and maintained in a structured electronic format". Revenue can ask for evidence of those controls. A business that opens the XML, prints it or saves only a PDF rendering, and discards the original file would not meet the last of those conditions.

Reverse-Charge Documents and Self-Billing

Where VAT is reverse-charged on a domestic supply, a specified person must still issue a structured document to the recipient, stating that the recipient accounts for the VAT. This applies to emissions allowances, scrap metal, construction work under the domestic reverse charge, gas and electricity supplied to dealers, gas and electricity certificates, and services from a subcontractor in a relevant contract. Construction businesses working under relevant contracts tax should keep today's Ireland RCT invoice and eRCT workflow requirements in view, because the 2028 format change does not remove the existing deduction and payment-notification controls.

Self-billing is covered as well. Where a specified person self-bills its Irish suppliers, it must issue those invoices in structured format and report their data to Revenue within 5 days of issue.

Real-Time Reporting

Under section 83A, a specified person transmits specified data on each transaction to Revenue "at the time when the invoice or other document is issued or should have been issued". A business issuing structured e-invoices voluntarily may report too. The data fields and the form of transmission are left to regulations, and a third party, such as a software provider, may transmit the data on a business's behalf.

From PDFs to Structured Data: What Actually Changes

If you currently send invoices as PDF attachments or print and post paper copies, the mandate changes how those invoices are created, transmitted and received once your business is in scope. It replaces the document itself with structured data.

A structured e-invoice is a machine-readable XML file that follows the EN 16931 European standard. Every data field, from supplier name and VAT number to line items, amounts and tax rates, sits in a defined position within the XML schema. Accounting software on the receiving end can ingest this data automatically, without a person opening a file, reading figures or keying them into a system.

This is where the common confusion starts. A PDF attached to an email is electronic, but it is not an e-invoice under the mandate. Revenue says the e-invoice must "exclude unstructured formats like PDF or scanned paper". PDFs, whether generated from accounting software or scanned from paper, need someone to read them or OCR to extract the data inside. For a business in scope, PDF invoices and scanned paper invoices will no longer satisfy VAT compliance requirements for the invoices it must issue in structured format. A business not yet in scope can keep issuing PDF invoices until its own date, so most businesses will receive a mix of PDF and structured invoices for years. For the rules every invoice must meet today, this breakdown of Irish VAT invoice field and simplified-invoice rules covers the mandatory content.

How the Peppol Network Works

Revenue has said the new system will use existing infrastructure, including the Peppol (Pan-European Public Procurement Online) framework that some Irish public bodies have used for B2G e-invoicing since 2019. If you have supplied a government department, you may already have sent invoices over it. Whether Peppol becomes the required channel for domestic B2B invoices has not been confirmed.

Peppol uses a four-corner model, which means your business does not connect directly to each trading partner. Instead, you connect to the network through a certified Peppol Access Point, a service provider that sends your e-invoices to the recipient's access point. Think of it like email: you do not deliver messages directly to the recipient's computer. Your email provider routes the message to their email provider, which delivers it to their inbox.

The four corners are:

The sender (your business)
The sender's access point (your certified Peppol provider)
The recipient's access point (their certified Peppol provider)
The recipient (your customer)

Access points find each other through the network's address lookup (the SML and SMP directories), which is a directory rather than a corner. Where a tax authority receives a copy of the invoice data, as Irish reporting will require, that link is often called the "fifth corner". How Irish reporting will connect has not been specified, though the Bill allows a third party such as an access point to transmit the data.

This architecture means one connection, your access point, reaches any other business on the Peppol network, regardless of what software it uses.

What Your Business Will Need

Three things will need to be in place before your date:

A way to send and receive structured e-invoices. Given Revenue's statements on Peppol, that is likely to mean a certified access point provider: a commercial service provider authorised to connect businesses to the network. You would choose a provider, register your business on the network, and use its service to send and receive e-invoices. Several providers already operate in Ireland because of the B2G requirement.

Accounting software that supports EN 16931. Your invoicing or ERP system needs to generate invoices in the correct structured XML format and receive incoming e-invoices in the same format. Many major accounting platforms have added or are adding EN 16931 support. If your current software cannot produce EN 16931 output, you will need to upgrade, switch providers, or use your access point's conversion tools.

Updated internal processes. This is the piece most businesses underestimate. If your accounts payable team opens PDF attachments, prints them, or keys in invoice data, those steps fall away for invoices from suppliers in scope, which arrive as structured data directly in your accounting system. Approval workflows, matching against purchase orders, exception handling and the way received invoices are stored all need to be rethought around that data.

How Ireland's Approach Differs From Other EU Mandates

Three things set Ireland's design apart. Phase 1 is scoped by which Revenue division manages a business's tax affairs, not by a turnover threshold, so a business can confirm its status with Revenue rather than calculate it. Ireland mandates domestic e-invoicing with per-invoice reporting ahead of the 2030 ViDA date. And it dates the receiving obligation for every business to the first phase, while most businesses have no sending date yet.

Real-Time Reporting and the End of VIES Returns

Today, Irish businesses report VAT in periodic returns, and their intra-Community supplies in VIES summary returns. Under the Bill, a business in scope instead reports data on each transaction to Revenue at the time the invoice is issued. ViDA brings the same shift to cross-border trade from 1 July 2030: invoices issued within 10 days of the transaction, data reported digitally, and the VIES returns eliminated, according to Revenue.

The move from period-end totals to per-transaction reporting means your invoicing and accounting systems need to generate and transmit structured data invoice by invoice, not just produce reports at period end. Until then, the bi-monthly VAT3 remains the workhorse return, and the rate-split workbook approach to building the VAT3 from supplier invoices walks through the T2, reverse-charge and RTD reconciliation steps that per-invoice reporting is meant to eventually automate.

How Other EU Countries Have Approached E-Invoicing

Ireland is not operating in a vacuum. Several EU member states have already implemented or are rolling out their own mandates, and each offers lessons worth studying.

Italy was the EU pioneer, making B2B e-invoicing mandatory in 2019 through its SDI (Sistema di Interscambio) clearance platform, which validates every invoice before it reaches the buyer. This guide to FatturaPA e-invoices from the receiver's side shows what that system sends to a buyer. Italian businesses had a difficult first few months, from software compatibility issues to workflow disruptions, and seven years on the system is mature.

France began its e-invoicing reform on 1 September 2026. Every business must be able to receive e-invoices, and large and mid-sized companies must issue them. Small and micro businesses follow on 1 September 2027. Invoices travel through accredited platforms rather than a single government hub.

Germany has required domestic businesses to be able to receive e-invoices since 1 January 2025. Suppliers with prior-year turnover above €800,000 must issue them from 2027, and the rest from 2028. Like Ireland, it dates receiving before sending, and the transition rules are set out in this guide to Germany's e-invoicing requirements.

Businesses comparing different EU operating models should also look at Finland's Finvoice, TEAPPSXML, and Peppol requirements, which show how a market with established structured-invoice rails differs from Ireland's later mandate-driven transition.

Poland's KSeF e-invoicing system (Krajowy System e-Faktur) takes the centralised route: invoices are cleared through a government platform before they carry legal force. After several postponements, it became mandatory for the largest businesses on 1 February 2026 and for other VAT-registered businesses on 1 April 2026.

Spain requires near-real-time invoice reporting from larger businesses through SII and is introducing VeriFactu certified invoicing software. Its B2B e-invoicing mandate comes from a separate law (Ley 18/2022), whose implementing order took effect on 6 October 2026: businesses with turnover above €8 million must issue B2B e-invoices from 6 October 2027, and the rest a year later.

Denmark has taken a different route again, mandating digital bookkeeping systems under its Bookkeeping Act rather than starting with transaction-level reporting. The rules reach beyond domestic firms, as this guide to Denmark's digital bookkeeping obligations for foreign VAT-registered businesses sets out for non-resident traders operating there.

Across the Irish Sea, the UK's upcoming e-invoicing mandate is developing independently post-Brexit. For the many Irish businesses that trade with UK counterparts, this means tracking two separate compliance regimes with different standards and timelines. It also helps to separate the e-invoicing rollout from the day-to-day customs and VAT treatment covered in this Ireland-UK post-Brexit invoicing guide.

What Irish Businesses Can Take Away

The pattern across Europe is consistent: governments are moving toward structured invoices and per-transaction reporting, and receiving is usually required before sending. Ireland's own schedule has been public since October 2025, and its technical detail is still to come in regulations, so preparation can start on the parts that are settled: receiving, storing and processing structured invoices. Businesses operating across borders should map which rules apply in each country where they are established or registered for VAT, rather than treating Ireland's requirements in isolation.

Penalties and What Non-Compliance Means

The Bill's e-invoicing and reporting provisions set obligations and leave the detail to regulations. They add no penalty of their own, and Revenue has not yet said how it will enforce the new duties. What the Bill does show is how the obligations fit into existing VAT law.

What the Bill Changes for Enforcement

The new rules sit in the VAT Consolidation Act 2010 beside today's invoicing rules, and existing provisions are amended to refer to them. One example: Revenue's power to require a business under inquiry to issue invoices (section 108B) is extended to the new structured e-invoices. Receivers, too, must be able to show Revenue the business controls they apply to the e-invoices they hold.

How Quickly Gaps Become Visible

Per-invoice reporting changes when Revenue sees a problem. Today, invoicing gaps tend to surface through returns and audits, sometimes years later. Under section 83A, Revenue receives data on each transaction when the invoice is issued, so a missing or late report shows up as it happens rather than at the next audit.

Supply Chain Disruption

From 1 November 2028, Phase 1 suppliers must send their Irish business customers structured e-invoices, and they do not need the customer's agreement to do so. Each invoice must carry the customer's VAT number, which the customer must supply on request. A business that cannot receive those invoices and keep them in structured form cannot meet its own obligation as a receiver, and it becomes a friction point for suppliers working to meet theirs. For smaller businesses that buy from large Irish suppliers, receiving readiness is the first deadline that applies to them.

How to Prepare: A Practical Checklist for Irish Businesses

Understanding the mandate is one thing. Acting on it is another. If you advise clients on tax and compliance, the following framework can also structure your client preparation conversations.

Work Out Your Date

Is your business a Large Corporates Division case? If so, you are in Phase 1 from 1 November 2028, and Revenue will write to confirm it.
Do you sell to, or buy from, businesses in other EU countries? Selling at the zero rate puts you in Phase 2 from 1 November 2029 on Revenue's description. Under the Bill as drafted, buying goods or reverse-charge services from EU suppliers does too.
Do you trade only within Ireland? You must be able to receive structured e-invoices from 1 November 2028. Your sending date has not been set, and you may issue structured e-invoices voluntarily before it.

Audit Your Current Invoicing Process

Before you can plan a transition, you need a clear picture of where you stand today. Map out exactly how your business currently sends and receives invoices:

Count your B2B invoice volume. How many invoices do you send and receive per month? This number determines the scale of your migration and influences which solutions make sense.
Identify format dependencies. Are you emailing PDF attachments? Printing and posting paper invoices? Uploading to supplier portals? Each of these workflows will need to change once your date arrives.
Flag manual processes. Any invoice that involves manual data entry, manual approval routing, or re-keying information between systems represents both a compliance gap and an efficiency opportunity.

The same review often surfaces adjacent finance documents that still depend on manual extraction and spreadsheet cleanup. If your team also reconciles local authority charges, a workflow for extracting Irish commercial rates bills into Excel can help standardise valuation and liability fields before they feed into budgeting and forecasting.

Document everything. This audit becomes the baseline against which you measure your readiness, and it is the first thing any implementation partner or software vendor will ask for.

Check Your Accounting Software

Your accounting or ERP system is the backbone of your invoicing workflow, and not every platform will be ready on your timeline. Contact your provider, whether that is Sage, Xero, QuickBooks or a sector-specific solution, and ask these specific questions:

Do you have or plan Peppol Access Point certification? Some providers will build this natively; others will partner with third-party access points.
When will you support EN 16931 format generation and receipt? You need the ability to both create and consume structured invoices in UBL or CII format.
What is your roadmap for Ireland-specific updates? The data Revenue will require is still to be set by regulations. Your provider should have a documented plan for implementing it, and for transmitting reports to Revenue on your behalf if you want it to.

If your current software will not support e-invoicing, begin evaluating alternatives now. Migrating accounting systems takes months, sometimes longer for businesses with complex configurations, custom integrations or large transaction histories. Waiting until 2028 to discover your platform cannot comply leaves little room to manoeuvre.

Select a Peppol Access Point Provider

If Peppol becomes the channel, as Revenue's statements suggest it is likely to, you will need a certified Peppol Access Point to send and receive e-invoices across the network. Think of this as your gateway to the Peppol infrastructure, much as you need an email provider to send email.

When evaluating providers, consider:

Irish market experience. Providers already operating in Ireland will understand local VAT requirements, Revenue integration expectations, and the specific needs of Irish businesses.
Reporting to Revenue. The Bill allows a third party to transmit your invoice data to Revenue. Ask whether the provider will offer that once the regulations set out the data and the method.
Pricing structure. Some charge per transaction, others offer flat monthly fees. Your invoice volume from the audit step directly affects which model is more cost-effective.
Implementation lead time. Onboarding with an access point is not instant. Factor in weeks or months for setup, testing and integration with your accounting software.
Cross-border capability. If you trade with businesses in other EU member states, your access point should already exchange invoices with those countries' Peppol participants.

OpenPeppol, the association that runs the network, publishes a public list of certified service providers. Start there rather than relying solely on vendor marketing.

Update Internal Processes

E-invoicing changes far more than the file format. It alters how invoices move through your organisation. Review and redesign these workflows:

Invoice approval chains. Structured e-invoices arrive instantly and can be routed automatically. If your current approval process involves printing, signing or scanning, it needs to be rebuilt for a digital-first flow.
Three-way matching. Matching invoices against purchase orders and goods received notes becomes faster with structured data, but only if your systems are configured to perform automated matching. Define your tolerance thresholds and exception rules now.
Exception handling. What happens when an e-invoice fails validation? When fields do not match your purchase order? When a supplier sends an invoice in the wrong format? Build clear escalation procedures before you go live.
Storage of received e-invoices. The Bill requires receivers to keep e-invoices in structured format, with controls for authenticity, integrity and an audit trail. Archive the XML itself, not only a printed or PDF copy.
Summary invoices and credit notes. If you are in scope, decide whether monthly summary invoices suit any of your customers, and make sure credit and debit notes go out in the same structured format as the invoice they amend.
Accounts payable and accounts receivable procedures. Both teams need updated standard operating procedures that reflect the new submission, receipt and reconciliation workflows.

Communicate With Your Trading Partners

Your readiness means little if your suppliers and customers are not prepared to exchange structured invoices with you.

Notify suppliers and customers about your planned e-invoicing go-live date. Give them enough lead time to prepare on their end.
Confirm the identifier you give suppliers. Each structured e-invoice must carry your VAT number, or the tax reference number Revenue assigns if you are not VAT-registered, and suppliers in scope may ask you for it.
Coordinate Peppol ID registration. Every participant on the Peppol network needs a registered identifier. If Peppol is the channel you use, confirm that your key trading partners have registered or plan to.
Align cross-border timelines. If you trade with businesses in Germany, France, Italy or other EU member states with their own e-invoicing mandates, coordinate your transition timelines. Your EU trading partners may already be on structured invoicing, or may be moving on a different schedule.

Start these conversations early. Large suppliers with hundreds of customers will prioritise businesses that engage proactively over those that reach out at the last minute.

Train Your Team

Budget for meaningful training well before your date, rather than a single webinar the week before go-live.

Finance staff need to understand EN 16931 structure, what validation errors mean, and how to resolve rejected invoices.
AP and AR teams need hands-on training with the new submission and receipt workflows in your updated software.
Procurement staff who raise purchase orders need to understand how their data feeds into the e-invoicing chain, since errors at the PO stage cascade into invoice rejections downstream.
Management needs enough understanding to make informed decisions about exceptions, process changes and resource allocation during the transition.

People need time to practise in a low-pressure environment before compliance becomes mandatory.

Test Before Going Live

Do not flip the switch on your compliance date and hope everything works. Run a parallel processing period where you send and receive invoices through both your existing process and the new e-invoicing system.

This parallel run will surface problems you cannot anticipate from planning alone: validation errors from inconsistent supplier data, workflow bottlenecks in your approval chain, integration failures between your accounting software and your access point, and edge cases in your exception handling procedures.

Allow at least three to six months for testing, enough to resolve integration issues and build team confidence before invoices must flow through the new system.

Set Your Timeline

Work backward from your date:

Phase 1 businesses (Large Corporates Division cases, notified by Revenue):

Begin preparation now if you have not already started
Complete software and access point selection by late 2027
Aim to be actively testing by mid-2028
Be sending, reporting and receiving before 1 November 2028

Phase 2 businesses (intra-EU traders, and Large Corporates Division cases as of 1 January 2028):

Be able to receive structured e-invoices by 1 November 2028
Begin preparing to send by early 2029 at the latest, sooner if your software needs replacing
Use the Phase 1 period to observe, learn from early adopters, and lock in your technology choices
Follow the Bill's final wording on purchases from EU suppliers

All other VAT-registered businesses:

Be able to receive structured e-invoices, and keep them in structured form, by 1 November 2028
Watch for Revenue's announcement of the domestic sending date

Ireland's e-invoicing mandate arrives in stages. For a small number of large businesses, the work is sending and reporting from November 2028. For businesses in EU trade, it follows a year later. For everyone, it starts with receiving on 1 November 2028. Work out which group you are in, talk to your software provider, and get receiving right first, while the Bill's final text and Revenue's regulations fill in the rest.