knowledge 11 February 2026 |

Large Corporates Within Scope for Phase One of Ireland’s VAT Modernisation Regime

On 10 February 2026, Revenue confirmed which “large corporates” will fall within scope for Phase One of Ireland’s VAT modernisation regime.

This follows Revenue’s October 2025 publication on implementing domestic e-Invoicing in advance of the EU’s VAT in the Digital Age (“ViDA”) reforms. ViDA aims to align VAT systems across the EU by introducing mandatory e-Invoicing and Real-time Reporting for all intra-EU business-to-business (“B2B”) transactions.

Phase One – VAT Registered Large Corporates

Ireland has adopted a phased rollout of the ViDA initiative to help Irish businesses prepare and build operational experience before the broader ViDA requirements apply to all cross-border EU transactions from 1 July 2030.

Phase One commences on 1 November 2028, at which point all VAT-registered large corporates will be required to issue e-Invoices in respect of domestic B2B transactions and report specified data from those e-Invoices to Revenue. On the same date, every business in Ireland must have processes in place to receive structured e-Invoices.

e-Invoicing is an end-to-end digital process. Accordingly, only structured electronic formats, such as XML files that comply with the EN16931 European Standard, will qualify as e-Invoices. Unstructured formats, such as PDFs or scanned documents, will not meet the new requirements.

These changes aim to streamline and automate VAT reporting while improving the ability of tax authorities to detect fraud and enhance compliance.

Businesses Within Scope – Large Corporates

For Phase One, a business is considered a “large corporate” if it is:

1. a VAT-registered business whose tax affairs are managed by the Large Corporates Division in the Revenue Commissioners; and
2. it is established or has a fixed establishment in Ireland.

Next Steps

The Revenue Commissioners have recommended that businesses within scope begin preparations now to ensure their systems can support the e-Invoicing requirements ahead of the 1 November 2028 deadline.

Large corporates can expect correspondence from the Revenue Commissioners in the coming weeks to confirm their inclusion in Phase One.

Phase Two, commencing in November 2029, will extend obligations to all VAT-registered businesses carrying out cross‑border EU B2B transactions that benefit from 0% VAT treatment.

Phase Three, beginning on 1 July 2030, coincides with the EU’s ViDa Directive taking effect across the EU. From this date, all cross-border B2B transactions must comply with the structured e-Invoicing rules in order to continue availing of the 0% VAT arrangements that apply to intra‑EU supplies.

The relevant Revenue press release is available here. For further information or if you would like assistance in determining whether your business falls within the scope of Phase One, please contact the team below or your usual McCann FitzGerald LLP contact.