Does the van talk to ZIMRA?
No. The handheld talks to Fiscalizer, and Fiscalizer talks to ZIMRA. An invoice counts as fiscalised in SalesBlitz once Fiscalizer has accepted it.
Fiscalisation
ZIMRA fiscalisation for van sales and point of sale
SalesBlitz fiscalises every invoice and credit note through Fiscalizer, a fiscalisation service that submits them to ZIMRA. The receipt is ready the moment the sale is made, and the van never waits on the tax authority.
Who does what
Your sales system, Fiscalizer and ZIMRA
ZIMRA fiscalisation (also spelt fiscalization) means each invoice and credit note is recorded with the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority through a registered fiscal device, and the receipt shows it. For a business that sells from vans, the hard part is that the sale happens on the road, often out of signal, and a seller can’t stand at a shop counter waiting for a tax system to answer.
SalesBlitz splits the work three ways:
- SalesBlitz makes the sale, the invoice and the receipt, on the handheld.
- Fiscalizer holds your fiscal devices, registered with the device IDs and activation keys ZIMRA issued, submits each document to ZIMRA, and looks after the fiscal day.
- ZIMRA receives the fiscalised documents from Fiscalizer.
The handheld never talks to ZIMRA. An invoice counts as fiscalised in SalesBlitz once Fiscalizer has accepted it.
How it works
What happens at the sale
The sale is saved at once
The seller completes the invoice on the handheld. It is saved immediately with SalesBlitz’s own invoice number. Nothing fiscal stands in its way.
The receipt is ready
The receipt carries a QR code that leads to the invoice on Fiscalizer, with the line “The device is operating offline, find your fiscalized invoice by scanning this code”.
The handheld sends it to Fiscalizer
In the background, the handheld sends the invoice straight to Fiscalizer with your company’s key; the SalesBlitz server is not in between. If Fiscalizer accepts it within a few seconds, while the receipt is still open, the receipt switches to Fiscalizer’s own QR code and shows Fiscalizer’s invoice number beside SalesBlitz’s.
No signal? It waits its turn
Otherwise the invoice stays in a queue on the handheld and is sent again on every sync, oldest first. A reprint always carries the best QR code the handheld has for that invoice.
Fiscalizer forwards to ZIMRA
Fiscalizer stores every valid document whatever ZIMRA’s state and passes it on, so an outage at ZIMRA holds up nothing on the road.
The run closes clean
At the end of the day, a run closes only when Fiscalizer has accepted every invoice and credit note in it. Nothing is left behind unfiscalised.
Corrections
Credit notes are fiscalised too
A completed invoice is never edited. Corrections are made with a credit note from the office, which SalesBlitz sends to Fiscalizer itself. A credit note is held back until its original invoice has been fiscalised, so it never reaches ZIMRA before the invoice it corrects, and one left unanswered is retried every two minutes.
Payments are not fiscal documents: the invoice is fiscalised with the payment method of the cashbook it was sold into, and later payments against it are recorded in SalesBlitz only.
Setting it up
Switching fiscalisation on
An account with Fiscalizer
Your company is set up in Fiscalizer, and each fiscal device is registered there with the device ID and activation key ZIMRA issued for it.
Connect
In SalesBlitz’s portal, an administrator pastes the Fiscalizer keys and runs Test connection. The keys are stored encrypted.
Map payments and devices
Each payment method is mapped to a fiscal money type (cash, card, mobile wallet, coupon, credit, bank transfer or other), and each handheld to a fiscal device. Several handhelds can share one.
HS codes on every product
Every product you sell needs its HS code, 4 or 8 digits, and 8 for zero-rated and exempt products. A product check in the portal lists the ones still missing.
Push the setup and switch on
Push the setup to Fiscalizer, then switch fiscalisation on. It is off by default for every company, and it can’t be switched on until each of these steps is done.
Taxes
VAT, customers and surtaxes
- Prices are VAT-inclusive and the fiscal total is the exact sum of the invoice’s own lines. The standard rate is 15.5%, and zero-rated and exempt products are told apart.
- A customer’s TIN (10 digits) and VAT number (9 digits) go on the fiscal invoice; a customer without a TIN is sent as a walk-in buyer.
- Surtaxes that carry VAT are sent to Fiscalizer as lines of their own; the others stay in SalesBlitz.
- Your Fiscalizer key is stored encrypted on the server and in Android’s secure key store on the handheld, and is wiped from the handheld when the run closes.
For the rest of what SalesBlitz does for Zimbabwean businesses, from ZiG and US dollar cashbooks to selling out of signal, see SalesBlitz in Zimbabwe.
Questions
ZIMRA fiscalisation: your questions
What happens when there is no signal at the shop?
The sale goes ahead and the receipt prints with a QR code that leads to the invoice on Fiscalizer. The invoice waits in a queue on the handheld and is sent to Fiscalizer the next time the handheld syncs.
What if ZIMRA’s system is down?
Nothing waits for it. Fiscalizer stores every valid invoice and credit note whatever ZIMRA’s state, and forwards them to ZIMRA itself. A ZIMRA outage doesn’t stop a sale or a van’s close.
What if Fiscalizer can’t be reached?
Selling carries on offline as usual. The seller can’t close the run until Fiscalizer has accepted every invoice and credit note in it, so no run is closed with anything left unfiscalised.
Can a fiscalised invoice be changed?
No. A completed invoice is never edited. Corrections are credit notes issued from the office, and SalesBlitz sends a credit note to Fiscalizer only once its original invoice has been fiscalised.
Do I need a Fiscalizer account?
Yes. Your fiscal devices are registered in Fiscalizer with the device IDs and activation keys ZIMRA issued, and SalesBlitz connects to Fiscalizer with your company’s keys.
Is SalesBlitz a fiscal device?
No. SalesBlitz is the sales system: it makes the invoices and receipts. Fiscalizer holds the registered fiscal devices and deals with ZIMRA.
Keep reading
Related
- Point of sale software
Invoices, payments and printed receipts on an Android handheld, at the customer’s counter.
- Van sales software
Route sales from a van: visits, mobile invoicing, van stock and cash, offline-first.
- Zimbabwe
ZiG and USD, VAT and surtaxes, ZIMRA, and routes where the signal drops.
- ERP integration
Products, prices and stock in from your ERP; every closed selling run back to it.
- Pricing
Per van, per month: $17, $19 with Bluetooth printing, $30 with a Sunmi handheld.
Fiscalised receipts, from the van
Run SalesBlitz on your own routes, then switch fiscalisation on when your Fiscalizer account is ready.