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Which date decides the quarter a document belongs to

Date of supply, invoice date, payment date — three dates, and only one counts. For purchase invoices the official wording settles it.

This page was last checked on: 27/08/2026

01The four cases

DocumentThe date that counts
Sales invoiceDate of supply, at the latest the invoice date
Sales invoice with a payment on accountFor the prepaid part: the date the payment arrives
Purchase invoiceThe invoice date
Credit noteThe date of the credit note

Exactly one of these depends on money: the payment on account. All the others depend on paper.

02For purchase invoices the form says it itself

„in order to include this amount, you must have a tax invoice with a date that falls within this tax period“
Help text for box 4 of the VAT return

That settles it: the date on the invoice. Not the day you paid, not the day the bank took the money, and not the day the document reached you.

An invoice that surfaces two quarters late therefore belongs in an amendment to the old quarter — not in the current one, where it merely happened to be found.

03Why not the payment date

Some software calculates on the payment date. That is cash accounting, and it is not a setting but a scheme a state has to offer and for which you need permission.

Calculate on the payment date without that permission and you have not calculated differently, you have calculated wrongly. And it stays hidden for a long time, because across a full year the totals come out almost the same.

There is a practical argument too: the recapitulative statement has no cash basis. If the return followed the payment date it would place the same invoice in a different quarter from the VIES statement — and that comparison is run by machine.

04The invoice has a deadline

The invoice must be issued within 30 days of the tax point. So the relevant date does not arise because you write the invoice — it is already there, and the invoice follows it.

That is why the period of supply is a required entry and not a courtesy: it says when the tax arose. On the old invoice our template was built from, it was missing.

05What this means in practice

  • A document is filed by its invoice date, not by the day you photographed it.
  • A late document calls for an amendment, not a posting into the current quarter.
  • A payment on account is the only case where the bank statement sets the date.
  • Writing an invoice late does not move the quarter.

The figures on this page

Every figure with its source and the day we last checked it there. What we cannot evidence appears as a gap, not as a number.

WhatValueSourceChecked on
Days from the tax point within which the invoice must be issued30Invobookz, tax rule set version 1.0 — derived from Regulation 11(5)27/08/2026

Related guides

The thirteen boxes of the Cyprus VAT returnWhich figure belongs in which box, for a company that supplies services. With the official wording quoted where it decides the answer.When the Cyprus VAT and VIES returns are dueTwo returns, two rhythms, two deadlines — and a quarter that is not necessarily the calendar quarter.Invoices in a foreign currency: which amount belongs in the returnThe invoice says dollars, the bank says euros, and nothing between them states a rate. What you enter — and what you must never do.

What this page is built from

  • The official help text for box 4 of the VAT return in Tax For All, captured verbatim.
  • The rule set Invobookz applies to give every document its tax point.

This text is orientation, not tax advice. What applies to your company is for your accountant to decide.