Getting a real invoice from authors

Here’s my problem… I want to buy something from envato and wish to pay with my company’s credit card and to do so I need an invoice for the amount purchased.
Now envato gives me an invoice for their share of the commission and now I need a separately invoice from the author for his share of the sale. Since most users don’t have a legal representation in the form of a company or something, they can’t give me a legal invoice I can use to justify my purchase in accounting. Which is illegal in the EU since I’ve just spent the company’s money and not have a document to cover that spending. This is how accounting works.
To fix this problem envato should ask authors to establish a company in their own country so they can release invoices. I’m sure for you authors everything is fine and dandy since most of you work from home and don’t declare any income and don’t pay any taxes either, but from a business point of view this is wrong and at the same time illegal!
Just as an example, one author tells me he can give me a paypal invoice but that’s not a real invoice. An invoice has to be released by a company with the company’s details on it to make it legal.
The whole thing is ridiculous!

So, next time of purchase, you should ask the author if he can provide the invoice.

All the authors should provide invoices! That’s the legal way to do it… it’s called business after all! If they don’t then they are evading the legal system, making them felons. And above all, envato is encouraging this behavior with their platform which sells digital goods illegally.

When you buy on Envato you get 2 invoices. One for Envato’s fee and one for the author’s sale. It would be more practical to have the transaction traced in a single invoice, but you are nonetheless provided with documents covering your spending.

the problem is, that the authors are not the direct sellers, no matter what Envato says - there is no contact between author and buyer, just between buyer and envato or author and envato

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What @PurpleFogSound said, you get 2 invoices which cover all the sum. We see it the same in our statements, 2 invoices for a sale. You`ve probably missed it.

@themac in that case envato is the one to blame. They are the ones evading taxes or whatever they’re doing. I’m a long time buyer and it wasn’t always like this.
@Soundlufs there are 3 invoices not 2! Take a look:
image
One of the invoices has the Author on it and also envato under “Supplier for VAT purposes:”. Now should I register this invoice with the author’s info or envato’s? And what if the author doesn’t have company details (as many users don’t)?
I don’t understand why can’t envato just release a single damn invoice with all the details specified there? The system is stupid from the buyer’s accounting point of view, but I bet it has certain “benefits” for envato.

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Yep, so it kind of makes your initial statement, that you dont have an invoice for the authors share of the sale, not exactly so, right?

I understand your pain, but please keep it civil, as many accusations sound just out of place. Have you actually had any trouble with those invoices, while dealing with your accountant, or the authorities? Seems like a simple “print and submit” to me. It is an invoice after all.

----EDIT— I wasn`t clear enough. Yes, there are many galleries, that sell goods of artists, and issue invoices on their behalf. Then the artist accounts for his share, once he gets it from the gallery.

It’s like we’re talking 2 different languages! Here… this is the invoice for the money that goes to the author (I’ve blurred some content for obvious privacy reasons):

If under the Author: line there are no information about the author’s company then of course this is not a valid invoice, do you understand this? Not sure how to explain it better. The accounting company that does the accounting for my company can’t register this kind of invoice. I’m from Romania, a EU country where the accounting system is a bit more complicated than in the US or Australia.
If you look right at the bottom you will see that envato collects only the VAT (20%) so in order to justify the rest of the payment I would need an invoice from the author. But if the author doesn’t have a company, he can’t give me an invoice, now can he? Which is the case of many authors on the envato market.
You’re saying that this is just “a simple Print and submit, it’s an invoice after all”. When the financial authorities come to pay a “visit” to my company and see such an “invoice” they would laugh in my face and tell me to stop kidding and show them the real invoice. Such an invoice can easily be forged since there are no easy ways of checking its validity.
So don’t tell me that there’s nothing fishing going on here, I wasn’t born yesterday you know! All the big companies find creative ways of evading taxes… recently google was fined by the EU… again for not playing fair!

Hopefully this time I was civil enough for you!

Sorry, I can`t see whats the problem. Yes, its an invoice, with Envato printed on it, unique number etc. You are covered.

If a gallery would sell your picture, you won`t be issuing anything to the buyer - they would. On their paper, with their numbering. You as an artist would have to account just the second part of this procedure, when the gallery pays your share.

Anyway, I hope your worries are in vain, and you won`t encounter any troubles over this, and continue to buy here. Cheers!

It’s not a valid invoice or in other words may not be appropriate for the tax authorities. This is because it’s issued by Envato (third party) and not the author. It’s issued in the name and on behalf of the author but without authors’ permission. There is no ‘Seller’ on the document (only ‘Author’ indicated). The “invoice” numbering here is Envato internal numbering. And the money goes to Envato, not the author directly.

EXACTLY! Finally someone that gets it!
And if I want to buy something, then I’m forced to use my personal paypal account and extract money from my company to compensate, which is not ok because they have to be covered with invoices.
The legal solution would to for envato to force users to create companies and issue invoices to buyers for each sale. That’s the legal way!
Again… what happens now it’s not legal, at least not in Europe! And it all benefits envato because since the users don’t have a legal entity and envato doesn’t issue a real invoice for the sellers money, then it’s easy for envato to just pay the sellers without any problems. This is the trick which doesn’t benefits the buyer in the end and leaks money which are never taxed. I’m willing to bet that most users don’t declare their income to their financial institutions.

@dpcdpc11 - I am from Romania too and an author here registered with a company and all the shebang, paying all the taxes on the Envato income. I agree with you that all authors should have a legal representation, a company or a pfa or whatever their country issue. This would fix so many issues with the accounting process.
Anyway, related to the invoices Envato release when you buy something, these are actually valid invoices and you can register them with your accountant just fine and if you get any visit from ANAF then you can explain them properly how the money flow is and it won’t be any issue at all.
If your accountants tell you the invoices are not valid, they are mistaken and you should find a new accountant sooner than later.

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Actually this are the problems that were directed to envato but were ignored. The previous system worked as it should. You would get an invoice from envato and that’s it. But envato (despite that they are denying that) set up this system for numerous reasons. If they get the whole sum, which they do, then they need to pay the whole tax and after that trough paying out commissions declare it as expense to get that tax back, which takes time and additional accounting expenses, bank commissions, transactions etc. and the biggest thing they would have to take the bigger chunk of responsibility.

Now if they start doing it the way you describe, then they cannot held on the money for that long of period of time, and we would have to have access to it like as a bank account.

So they conjured up the system which still abides by EU internet market store laws (which does state that online marketplace has to take care of VAT and rest taxes).

This system relives them from most of responsibilities and was set to further on allows implementation of recent moves.

Hence leaves us to battle with, laws, bills, accountants etc.

Luckily for us the most relevant thing is from were and how much money ends up on the bank account.
But this processes that envato implemented are shady at best and are just screaming for a lawsuit.

And every time they say this was made for better transparency and for the good of community its a blunt and disrespectful
(to be polite) “not true”

Cheers

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sorry for the Romanian language, but I dunno how to explain this better to my fellow Romanian here!

@twisted1919 am inteles ca esti autor, dar te-ai pus vreodata in postura de buyer sa vezi exact ce facturi primesti? Uita-te peste asa-zisa factura ce am atasat-o mai sus… aia n-ai cum s-o inregistrezi in contabilitatea romaneasca pana-o face plopu pere! Exact cu zicea si QuanticaLabs mai sus… e un “invoice” cica released de envato in numele clientului (care-i bullshit) dar pe factura scrie clar ca envato isi asuma raspunderea doar pentru TVA. Pe o factura tre sa apara clar: Cumparator si Vanzator. Aici in loc de vanzator apare Author (datele autorului) si Supplier for VAT purposes (datele envato).
Degeaba apar datele de firma ale autorului, de exemplu firma ta, ca factura asta nu e emisa de firma ta iar ea nu intra in contabilitate la tine.
Astfel daca duc asa ceva la contabil el ma intreaba: care-i furnizorul (vanzatorul)? Pai, envato. Really? Pe factura nu scrie asa ceva. Intelegi?
N-am nicio treaba cu autorii and shit dar ma deranjeaza ca atunci cand vrei sa fii cinstit nu poti si esti luat de fraier. Plus ca e enervant cand tu platesti taxele si alte cheltuieli cu firma, angajati, etc. si te chinui sa supravietuiesti, sunt o gramada de freelanceri ce lucreaza de-acasa, cu cheltuieli minime fara sa plateasca un ban la stat. Si mai nasol e ca ne furam pe noi… adica toti beneficiem de drumuri, parcuri, etc. asa cum sunt ele!
Sper ca m-am facut inteles ca nu e complicat deloc. Asa ca nu mai tineti parte celor de la envato ca e clar ce se intampla aici. Inteleg ca prin ei va faceti banii (poate aveti si alte surse), dar acceptati macar realitatea cand dovezile sunt clare si vizibile de pe luna!
Nicio corporatie n-o sa admita ca fac frauda ci vor plati benevol amenzile date de UE periodic si isi vor vedea in continuare de treaba… vezi cazul Google, Facebook etc.

That’s right! And I don’t understand why some people here keep defending envato since it’s clear what’s happening!
And they keep denying that my claims are not true when it’s obvious why the made the system like this: to benefit them, just like you described.
The real problem is that we are too small and insignificant to make a difference and it’s almost impossible to take down juggernauts like these! Suing theme would make me bankrupt in a matter of months maybe even faster.
So there’s not much for me to do than barking here on this forum and getting in conflict with the smarty pants around here.

Lets get something clear, my intent is not to take down anyone, it’s simply to make us authors a simpler solution and with that more time to focus on what matters, bringing better products to our clients and with that better experience overall.

All of my comments sarcastic and sometimes mean are just there to open a different view and make space for improvement, but i do know they are quite insignificant. But i do love this community and Envato however distorted as they became.

Hi, sorry if my question has already an answer in another topic.

My problem is that in all EU invoices must include info like real name and address of the buyers. Here is an official link:

Important: The simplified invoice rule- where this data is not compulsory- is not aplicable (in many EU countries) to distance sales or Intracommunitary trades. There are also restrictions (different from country to country) on maximum amount of sale.

In these conditions, an author from EU can’t use for accounting the invoices issued by Envato (as third party) in his name.

A solution (for accounting use) can be an invoice issued by authors to Envato for the sold items. But in this case the same item was sold twice, legally (both invoices are valid).

@dpcdpc11 Did you solve it in the end? How?
I’m having the same problem. This time, the author is a company from Romania, I am from Romania, but I only got that invoice with “Author” and “Supplier for VAT purposes” and the currency in USD.
I asked the author for a proper invoice (in RON) and he declined, saying that invoice is enough and they are using it as it is for accountancy.

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envato should check the company vat nr, is easy and it can eliminate fake authors.

But what do you do when you get fake invoices from clients ?

I spoke with Envato and there is nothing that they will do … so use the invoice you get, if is real or not, that’s a different story.