When carrying out a transaction by courier in Bulgaria, a question arises about the documentary justification of the business operation. In order for the business operation to be documented, a primary accounting document must be issued, accurately reflecting the business operation. In this case, the costs incurred may be recognized as an accounting expense.
There is no specific requirement for the name of the primary accounting document. It can be an invoice, a protocol, a contract, an agreement and others.
The primary accounting document contains at least the following information: a name and a number of the document, containing only arabic numerals; a date of issue; a name or a title, an address and а unique identification code of the Commercial register or a unique identification code according to Bulstat or a unique civil number or a personal number of a foreigner, of the publisher and the recipient; а subject, а natural and а value expression of the business operation.
The Accounting Act exhaustively specifies the persons that are enterprises and that are obliged to comply with the requirements of the accounting legislation in the order, organization and form of documentation provided by law.
This group of persons includes: the traders within the meaning of the Commercial Act, including the branches of the foreign merchants; the commercial representations; the foreign legal entities engaged in business activities in Bulgaria through a place of business, except in cases where the business is carried out by a foreign person from a member state of the European Union or from another state – party to the Agreement on The European Economic Area, only under the conditions of freedom to provide services.
Natural persons are not specified as exhaustively listed and are not considered to be enterprises. To admit the accounting expense for tax purposes, the documents received by the company, issued by individuals and other persons should contain information that indisputably proves the actual business transaction.
In accordance with the Accounting Act and the applicable tax law, traders are required to justify by primary accounting documents the accounting costs reported by them.
Therefore, for tax purposes, it is necessary to be simultaneously established:
– documentary justification of the accounting expense – a primary accounting document that contains the required minimum information and / or other documents certifying the missing information (payment documents, agreements, offers, contracts, transport documents, documents from a courier company, protocols and other documents created in connection with the commercial activity);
– reality of the reported business operation.
Documentary justification is also present when the primary accounting document is issued by a person that is not an enterprise within the meaning of the Accounting Act, and the document lacks some of the required information when this document accurately reflects the documented business transaction.
Therefore, in order to have a documented justification of the costs related to the activity of purchasing items by courier, the company needs to have primary accounting documents with the minimum number of details. These documents identify both parties to the transaction and serve to prove the purchases and theirs entry in the accounting registers.
In conclusion, the trader who carries out the activity of purchase by courier should organize his document flow in accordance with the requirements of the accounting legislation.
For advice on accounting documentation of transactions, you can contact our experts.