IVA and electronic invoicing in Colombia (2026): a guide

Colombia's value added tax, the impuesto sobre las ventas (IVA), is charged at 19% on most goods and services, with a 5% rate for a short list of goods and a 0% rate for exempt goods and services such as exports. It is administered by the Dirección de Impuestos y Aduanas Nacionales (DIAN), which also runs one of Latin America's most complete electronic invoicing systems. This guide covers the rules a small business needs in October 2026, with examples in Colombian pesos (COP). Many thresholds are set in UVT (Unidad de Valor Tributario), which is COP 52,374 in 2026 (DIAN Resolution 000238 of 2025).

IVA in Colombia at a glance

IVA rates: 19%, 5%, exempt and excluded

• 19%, general rate (Article 468 of the Estatuto Tributario): everything the law does not move to another rate, including most professional services.
• 5% (Article 468-1): a list of goods that, according to PwC, includes certain industrial corn and grains, several vegetable oils, animal feed materials, some agricultural equipment and some electric or hybrid vehicles.
• Exempt, 0%: exports of goods and services, meat, fresh eggs and dairy, among others. You charge no IVA but keep the right to recover the IVA on your purchases.
• Excluded: no IVA at all, and no credit for the IVA you paid to make these sales. PwC lists freight transport, public passenger transport, interest on credit operations and public utility services among them.
• Restaurants: most restaurant services pay the 8% impuesto nacional al consumo (Article 512-9) instead of IVA. It must be shown on the invoice and included in the menu price.

The difference between exempt and excluded matters: with exempt sales you can recover input IVA; with excluded sales the IVA you pay on costs becomes a cost.

Who must register: RUT, NIT and the 3,500 UVT test

Every business registers in the Registro Único Tributario (RUT) with the DIAN before it starts trading (Article 555-2). Your tax ID is the NIT (Número de Identificación Tributaria), followed by a check digit (dígito de verificación).

Companies (personas jurídicas) that make taxable sales are always IVA-responsible from the first sale. Individuals who are retailers, artisans, small farmers or service providers can be non-responsible (no responsables de IVA) only while they meet all of these conditions (Article 437, paragraph 3):

1. 1gross income from the activity below 3,500 UVT last year and this year (COP 183,309,000 in 2026)
2. 2no more than one shop, office or business premises
3. 3no franchise, concession, royalty or similar arrangement at those premises
4. 4not a customs user
5. 5no single contract for taxable goods or services of 3,500 UVT or more, this year or last year
6. 6bank deposits and investments from taxable activities not above 3,500 UVT, this year or last year

Fail one and you must register as IVA-responsible. Non-responsible sellers must give business customers a copy of their RUT showing that status.

Returns, deadlines and reteIVA

The IVA period depends on last year's gross income (Article 600):

You file and pay in the month after the period, between the 7th and the 16th business day, depending on the last digit of your NIT (without the check digit): digit 1 files first, digit 0 last. Decree 2229 of 2023 fixed this calendar for 2024 and every following year. If you had no taxable operations and nothing to deduct in a period, no return is due for it.

ReteIVA (VAT withholding). Withholding agents, such as public entities and large taxpayers, keep part of the IVA when they pay you and pay it to the DIAN on your behalf. Unless a special rate applies, it is 15% of the IVA (Article 437-1). You deduct the withheld amount in your own IVA return, so keep the withholding certificates. Income tax withholding (retención en la fuente) and the municipal industry and commerce tax withholding (ReteICA) are separate.

The electronic invoice: what it must contain

Article 617 of the Estatuto Tributario sets the basic invoice requirements, and DIAN Resolution 000165 of 2023 (Article 11, now compiled in the single DIAN Resolution 000227 of 2025) adds those of the electronic sales invoice:

The invoice is only issued once the DIAN has validated it and you have delivered it to your customer, as an XML file with the DIAN's validation inside the electronic container.

Numbering

Each invoice series needs a numbering range authorised by the DIAN through its online numbering service. Numbers must be consecutive within the range.

Credit and debit notes

A validated invoice cannot be deleted or edited. You correct it with an electronic credit note (nota crédito) or debit note (nota débito), which must carry its own consecutive number, the prefix, number, CUFE and date of the invoice it corrects, and its own unique code (CUDE). Like invoices, notes are validated by the DIAN (Resolution 000165 of 2023, Article 36).

POS tickets and other equivalent documents

Shops and other businesses that sell to consumers can issue an electronic POS ticket (documento equivalente electrónico) instead of an invoice, but only for sales of up to 5 UVT (COP 261,870 in 2026) before taxes, and the customer can always ask for an invoice (Article 616-1). A POS ticket gives the buyer no IVA credit and does not support costs, so business customers will ask for a factura. The electronic POS ticket became mandatory between May and July 2024, by type of taxpayer.

Buying from people who do not invoice

When you buy from someone who is not obliged to invoice, for example a non-responsible individual, you generate a documento soporte (support document for purchases from non-obligated sellers) in the DIAN system to support the cost. Payroll is also electronic, through the electronic payroll support document.

Record keeping

Keep your invoices, books and supporting documents for at least five years from 1 January of the year after they were issued or received (Article 632).

E-invoicing in Colombia: how the system works and what is coming

Colombia uses prior validation (validación previa): your system sends each invoice, credit note and debit note to the DIAN, which validates it before it is delivered. Every business obliged to invoice, including every IVA-responsible business, must invoice electronically; a paper invoice is only valid when your own system has a technical problem. If the DIAN's platform is down, you may issue without validation and must transmit the invoice within 48 hours after the problem is solved (Article 616-1).

What else to know:

• Free DIAN tool. The DIAN offers a free invoicing service with no limit on the number of invoices, alongside commercial technology providers (proveedores tecnológicos).
• Acknowledgements for credit sales. When you sell on credit, your customer must confirm electronically that they received the invoice and the goods or services; with those messages the invoice supports their costs, deductions and IVA credit.
• RADIAN. Invoices that circulate as negotiable instruments (título valor), for example in factoring, are registered in the DIAN's RADIAN register.
• What changed. The DIAN compiled its tax resolutions, including the invoicing rules of Resolution 000165 of 2023, into a single Resolution 000227 of 2025. In July 2026 the DIAN also reinforced the security of its e-invoice catalogue.
• Announced, not law. A tax bill filed in Congress on 20 July 2026 proposes, among other things, moving hybrid vehicles from the 5% rate to 19% and new IVA measures for online gambling. When PwC last reviewed it, it was a bill only; check its status before relying on it.

Issuing electronic invoices requires a DIAN-authorised solution: the DIAN's free service or a technology provider. If your invoicing software is not one, you need one of those for the validation step.

Worked example in pesos

You run a small marketing agency in Bogotá that is IVA-responsible and invoices a client:

Over a four-month period you invoice COP 40,000,000 plus COP 7,600,000 of IVA, and buy COP 15,000,000 of services and equipment with COP 2,850,000 of IVA. Customers withheld COP 570,000 of reteIVA. Your IVA to pay is COP 7,600,000 − COP 2,850,000 − COP 570,000 = COP 4,180,000.

Late payment between businesses

Colombia has a fair payment terms law (Law 2024 of 2020): businesses must pay their commercial invoices within at most 45 calendar days from receiving the goods or the end of the service. The rule cannot be changed by contract, does not apply between two large companies or to consumer sales, and lets the creditor claim the documented costs of collection. An invoice that is not rejected within the legal terms is treated as accepted.

If no late-payment interest was agreed, Article 884 of the Commercial Code sets it at 1.5 times the current banking interest rate certified by the financial regulator; agreeing more than that legal maximum means losing all the interest. Our guide on how to get paid faster has practical ideas for collections.

Common mistakes

1. 1Charging IVA as a non-responsible individual, or staying non-responsible after failing one of the six conditions of the 3,500 UVT test.
2. 2Issuing a POS ticket above 5 UVT, or to a business customer who needs a factura to deduct the cost.
3. 3Treating excluded sales as exempt and claiming input IVA you cannot recover.
4. 4Forgetting to deduct reteIVA withheld by your customers in your own return.
5. 5Correcting an invoice by issuing a new one instead of a credit note that cites the original CUFE.
6. 6Buying from non-invoicing suppliers without a documento soporte, so the cost is not supported.
7. 7Missing your NIT's deadline, which DIAN sets by the last digit and does not move for you.

How Clientlly helps

Clientlly numbers your invoices sequentially per series and applies Colombia's IVA rates on every invoice. Credit notes are linked to the original invoice, invoice PDFs go out in your client's language, and you can invoice in several currencies. Each invoice can carry a card payment link, you see when your client opened it, and automatic reminders go out 3, 14 and 30 days after the due date; recurring invoices handle monthly retainers. Scan supplier receipts and the IVA is read automatically. Clientlly keeps sales and purchase tax books per rate, including exports, and prepares tax reports for you and your accountant (contador), with Excel and PDF exports. You can import clients, suppliers, products and opening balances from Excel or CSV, and use the mobile app on the go.

Clientlly is not a DIAN technology provider and does not validate invoices with the DIAN: for that step you need the DIAN's free service or an authorised technology provider. See the invoicing features and reporting.