The invoice follows a certification, not a sale
Work is valued, submitted for certification, and only then invoiced. The timing and the amount are determined outside your accounting system, which affects when a compliant invoice can even be issued.
Contracting & construction
UAE e-invoicing for contractors.
Contracting invoices are not raised freely — they follow a valuation that has been submitted, reviewed and certified, often weeks after the work. Retention is withheld, variations are argued, and payment applications and tax invoices are not the same document. Structured invoicing has to accommodate all of that without changing how the commercial process works.
Why this is harder than the generic case
Retention and its release
Amounts withheld across the life of a project and released long afterwards create documents that reference work invoiced months or years earlier.
Variations and disputed amounts
Where a certified amount differs from the application, the resulting adjustment has to be represented as a proper structured document rather than an informal correction.
The systems environment we usually find
Project costing alongside accounting
Valuations and cost tracking in a project system, invoices raised in the ledger, with the link between them maintained manually more often than not.
Documents produced outside the system
Payment applications and certificates frequently exist as spreadsheets or PDFs, with only the final figure entering the accounting system.
Joint ventures and multiple entities
Project-specific entities and JV arrangements each carry their own tax position and scope question.
What tends to need resolving
Establishing scope per entity, including project entities
Where projects are run through separate entities, each needs its own scope and deadline answer.
Representing retention correctly
How retention is shown on the invoice and how its later release is documented needs settling before go-live.
The gap between certification and invoicing
If the certified figure arrives by email and is keyed in manually, that step becomes part of the compliance chain and needs to be reliable.
How we work on this
- 01Establish scope and deadlines across operating and project entities
- 02Map how a valuation becomes an invoice today, including the manual steps
- 03Define the treatment of retention, variations and release documents
- 04Assess customer master data, particularly for main contractors and developers
- 05Select and coordinate an accredited provider suited to this document profile
- 06Map, validate and test against real project billing cases
- 07Stay through the first full month-end after go-live
Tax treatment of retention and certified amounts is a question for your tax advisor. We work alongside them rather than substituting for them.