What the BIR's system needs

The BIR publishes two technical documents for the EIS: an e-invoice JSON file format and an API development guide. Together they set out what an invoice must contain, how each field is written, and how invoices are signed and sent.

  • The data. Each invoice in the BIR's JSON format: seller and buyer details, invoice number and date, line items, VAT breakdown and totals.
  • The connection. An authenticated, signed connection to the BIR's EIS interfaces, tested in the BIR's sandbox before certification.
  • The follow-through. A way to read the BIR's response for each invoice, retry technical failures and correct real errors.

Most ERPs were not built with the BIR's format in mind. The data is usually there, spread across tables and fields named for the ERP's own purposes.

Sources: BIR EIS e-invoice JSON file format; BIR EIS API development guide.

Three ways companies connect

Build it in-house

Your IT team builds the conversion, signing and transmission. You control everything, and you also own every BIR specification change from then on.

Change the ERP

Some ERP vendors and partners offer an add-on or customisation. It keeps everything in one system, but it changes the ERP and is tied to that one platform, which matters for groups with more than one ERP.

A separate solution that reads from the ERP

A dedicated solution reads the ERP's exports or database views, converts and checks the data, and handles the BIR connection. The ERP stays as it is. This is how Resibo works.

What to prepare

  • One sample export of a month of sales invoices, from each billing system. CSV or Excel is fine.
  • A list of your companies and branches, with their TINs, branch codes and registered invoice series.
  • An owner in finance who knows the invoices, and a contact in IT who knows where the data sits.
  • The route your IT team prefers: a shared folder, SFTP or a database view.

What usually needs attention

In real exports, the gaps tend to be the same: invoice dates, serial ranges, buyer TINs, VAT classification, line items without quantity or unit cost net of VAT, and rounding in totals. Credit and debit memos, and invoices from more than one system for the same company, need care too.

Questions worth asking any vendor

  • Does it write anything to our ERP, or only read?
  • Where does our invoice data sit, and who can see it?
  • Who approves a change to tax data before it is sent again?
  • How are technical retries kept apart from real corrections?
  • How do BIR specification changes reach us, and do they change our feed?
  • What record do our auditors get, and can they verify it themselves?
  • What happens if we have more than one ERP, or more than one company?
  • Can it serve all our companies, with each company's licence and data kept apart?

How Resibo connects

Resibo reads from a shared folder, SFTP or a database view, on the schedule you set, and never writes back. Your team maps the export to the BIR format on screen in Mapping Studio, with no coding. If your system cannot export what is needed, our team works with yours to set up the export or connection. See how integration works.

This guide is general information about the BIR's published rules and specifications. It is not tax advice. Your tax adviser confirms how the rules apply to your company.