In Peru, most invoices (facturas) and receipts (boletas de venta) are electronic and reported to SUNAT, the tax authority. Before booking an expense or claiming VAT credit on it, you can confirm it is valid with SUNAT's validity check, the consulta de validez del comprobante de pago.
Checking one document
The individual check needs no Clave SOL. Enter:
- the issuer's RUC;
- the type of document (factura, boleta, credit or debit note, fee receipt);
- the series and the number;
- the issue date;
- the total, which is required for electronic documents.
The result says whether SUNAT has the document as valid, or whether it was cancelled, rejected or never reported. A boleta or factura that does not appear should be raised with the seller before you rely on it.
Checking many at once
With Clave SOL, a business can upload a text file of up to 100 lines, one document per line with the RUC, type code, series, number, date and total, and get the status of each. Companies with higher volumes use SUNAT's integrated check web service from their own systems.
Paper documents
Some issuers still use printed comprobantes. For those, the check confirms that SUNAT authorized the printing of that series and number for that issuer.
Invoices received by your business
With Clave SOL, a business can also review the electronic invoices issued to its RUC in SUNAT Operaciones en Línea, filtering by period and issuer.
Keeping the receipts
A valid boleta still has to be kept. Photograph it in the Smartbills app, or forward the email it arrived in, and it is kept with its items, every tax and the total, ready for an expense report.