HMRC's VAT guide (Notice 700, section 16) sets out the particulars a full VAT invoice must show. The rules themselves sit in the VAT Regulations 1995; Notice 700 is the practitioner's working reference, and it is published on gov.uk.
The particulars
- A sequential identifying number
- The time of supply (tax point), and the date of issue if different
- The supplier's name, address and VAT registration number
- The customer's name and address
- A description sufficient to identify the goods or services supplied
- For each description: the quantity of goods or extent of services, the unit price, the rate of VAT, and the amount payable excluding VAT
- The total amount payable excluding VAT
- The rate of any cash discount offered
- The total VAT chargeable, in sterling, even when the invoice itself is in another currency
Why presence checks matter more than they sound
On real supplier paperwork the misses are constant: a trading-style header with no registered address, a VAT number on the remittance slip but not the invoice, line items with totals but no quantity or unit price. Each gap weakens the document as evidence for input tax, which is the whole reason the invoice exists in your records.
Eleven of these particulars map directly onto NoticeDesk's presence checks, and a twelfth check looks for the total including VAT. They run on every document, with the gov.uk reference attached to any particular found missing.