The firms have issued and used more than 600 million e-invoices, the department reported.

However, the number of firms using e-invoices is still modest as there are more than 500,000 firms in the country.

The GDT currently permits firms to use either paper invoices or e-invoices. However, the use of e-invoices will be compulsory for all firms, organizations and State agencies by 2019, with the exception of small-and micro-firms.

The finance ministry had previously put forward a plan to make e-invoices compulsory for all enterprises from January 2018, but while many enterprises admitted that the use of e-invoices had major benefits, they also said that deadline was hard to meet.

According to the GDT, the use of e-invoices saves time and reduces costs for businesses while limiting billing fraud and simplifying administrative procedures.

The GDT estimated that with some 2.5 billion invoices used in a year, firms could save VND1 trillion (US$43.86 million) if they switched from paper bills to e-invoices.

Industry insiders said the application of information technology (IT) in business, specifically in the form of e-invoices, is a common trend among the world’s advanced economies.

In Viet Nam, the improving IT infrastructure has also created favourable conditions for the use of e-invoices. However, Vietnamese firms still need to promote the application of new technological solutions to enhance management and competitiveness.

Aside from the use of e-invoices, the GDT has also sped up reforms in the application of information technology to improve its own management.

According to the latest GDT report, up to 96.21 per cent of the country’s firms have so far registered to pay their taxes online. Tax revenues collected electronically in the first three months of 2018 reached over VND120.6 trillion from 976,000 transactions.

During the same period, more than 648,000 firms used electronic tax declaration services with some 48 million applications, while more than 2,800 firms also used electronic tax refund services to secure refunds amounting to VND13 trillion. — VNS