What an invoice must include in the UK, Canada and Australia

Try it

The button asks askROI for a finished VAT invoice as a PDF from a made-up design studio, then asks it to check the invoice against HMRC's list. Swap in your own business, client and amounts, and send it.

What must an invoice include? Less than most invoice templates suggest, until you register for VAT or GST. Then the tax office decides the fields, and in Canada and Australia the list grows with the amount.

Below is the short list every invoice needs, then the rules for the UK, Canada and Australia, taken from HMRC, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) and the Australian Taxation Office (ATO). We checked every source on November 6, 2026.

What every invoice needs

Start with the fields that make an invoice usable anywhere. GOV.UK's page on what an invoice must include is a good baseline even outside the UK:

• a unique identification number
• your business name, address and contact details
• the name and address of the customer you are invoicing
• a clear description of what you are charging for
• the date you supplied the goods or service, and the date of the invoice
• the amounts charged, any tax, and the total owed

Give each invoice a unique number in a sequence (2027-001, 2027-002 and so on). On a VAT invoice, HMRC asks for a sequential number "based on one or more series" that uniquely identifies it, so separate series are fine, and numbered invoices make chasing a late payment much easier.

United Kingdom: VAT invoice requirements

If you are not registered for VAT, the list above is the job. GOV.UK adds that a sole trader shows their own name and any business name, plus an address where legal documents can be delivered if they trade under a business name. A limited company shows its full name as it appears on its certificate of incorporation.

Once you are VAT registered, HMRC says you must issue a VAT invoice whenever you supply standard or reduced rate goods or services to another VAT-registered person, normally within 30 days of the supply. A full VAT invoice shows, under section 4.1 of VAT Notice 700/21:

• a sequential number, based on one or more series, that uniquely identifies the invoice
• the time of supply (the tax point), and the date of issue if it is different
• your name, address and VAT registration number
• the customer's name and address
• a description that identifies the goods or services
• for each description, the quantity or extent, the unit price and the rate of VAT
• the amount payable excluding VAT, and the total excluding VAT
• the rate of any cash discount offered
• the total VAT, in pounds sterling

Simplified invoices. When a single supply is £250 or less including VAT, section 4.5 lets you issue a shorter invoice: your name, address and VAT number, the time of supply, a description, and for each VAT rate the total including VAT and the rate charged. Exempt supplies cannot go on one.

Canada: GST invoice requirements, by amount

Canada sets its rules from the buyer's side: rather than a list of fields every invoice must carry, the CRA says what a GST/HST-registered buyer needs in their receipts, invoices or other records to claim an input tax credit (getting back the GST/HST they paid). Its input tax credits page lists those details in three bands, based on the total sale, and your invoice is the easiest place for your client to find them.

The same bands appear in the CRA guide RC4022, General Information for GST/HST Registrants. In practice, put every field on every invoice. Your client never has to ask for a corrected one, and you never have to remember which band a sale fell in.

Australia: tax invoice requirements and the ABN

In Australia, the ATO's tax invoices page sets the rule: a business registered for GST has to give a tax invoice when the customer asks for one and the taxable sale is more than $82.50 including GST, within 28 days of the request, and the page also sets a $1,000 threshold for what the invoice has to show. The government's business.gov.au invoicing page words the duty more broadly, so follow the ATO's page, which is the tax authority's own.

The ATO's checklist for a tax invoice, as its Tax, Super + You GST fast facts lists it:

• it says it is a tax invoice
• the date it was issued
• your name or business name and your ABN (Australian Business Number)
• the buyer's identity or ABN, for sales of $1,000 or more
• a brief description of what you sold, with quantity and price
• the GST amount payable, if any
• the extent to which each sale is a taxable sale

The $1,000 line is the one people miss. Below it, the list does not ask for the buyer at all; from $1,000, the invoice must name the buyer or show their ABN.

Making the invoice

The invoice generator is built around these lists. It titles a UK invoice "VAT invoice" when the seller charges VAT, an Australian one "Tax invoice", and puts the CRA's fields on Canadian invoices at any amount. It checks that line totals, tax and the total add up before it saves the PDF, and where you leave out a VAT number or bank details, it puts a marked placeholder in the document instead of making one up. The Try it prompt above starts the same request from this page. You will need a free account to send it.

Invoices are half the paperwork. The expense report generator turns your receipts into a spreadsheet with subtotals by category, and the Excel generator can build a sheet that tracks which invoices are paid.

Check the rules once, then reuse the template

Thresholds and field lists do change. Check your country's page when you register for VAT or GST, build one invoice that has every field, and reuse it. This post is general information, not tax advice; for anything unusual, such as selling across borders, ask an accountant.