When something is wrong — transcript

Play this as a presentation — one slide per step, with the same narration. Every word of every step is on this page.

This lesson is for you if something has gone wrong and you want to know how much of it you can put right yourself. In about ten minutes you will learn to tell the two quite different kinds of wrong apart, fix the one that is genuinely your own data, use the reject button properly and understand what it does and does not do, and name the jobs that belong to the shop so you can ask for them plainly instead of hunting for a button that does not exist.

Step 1 — Tell the two kinds of wrong apart

After this step you will know which problem you have, because they have completely different answers. The first is a request that has not produced a good e-invoice, and your own screen splits it in two. Still in the queue means nothing has reached LHDN: the shop’s system has not sent it, or tried and could not. Validation error means it did reach LHDN and LHDN refused it. The second kind of wrong is not a refusal at all — an e-invoice LHDN accepted that is nevertheless wrong, the amount, the items, your name spelled a different way. That one is a filed tax record and nobody can edit it, not you and not the shop. It can only be cancelled inside a short window, or corrected afterwards by a second document.

Reference: Storefront E-Invoice Request — Requested E-Invoices, Cancellation and History

Step 2 — Fix the part that is genuinely yours

After this step you will know how far you can get on your own, and where you have to stop. There is a ten-second test: search for the same receipt again. If the Request button is back on the result, nothing was ever sent — your tax number and your identification are yours to correct, so check the pair with the verify control and ask again, and if a number looks perfectly right and keeps failing, delete the field and type it by hand, because a number copied out of a browser can carry an invisible character the screen does not show you. If instead you get the amber banner saying the invoice has already been submitted, there is no second request to make. Telephone the shop and ask them to correct it and resubmit.

Reference: Storefront E-Invoice Request — Troubleshooting

Step 3 — Raise a rejection while the clock is still running

After this step you will know what the reject button really does. On an e-invoice LHDN has validated, and only while a countdown of seventy-two hours from that validation is still running, you can request a rejection, choose a reason — wrong buyer details, wrong invoice details, or something you type yourself — and send it. Understand what you have just sent. It is a request to the shop, not a cancellation. Nothing reaches LHDN until somebody there approves it and processes it, and the reason you typed is what they will read. You also need an account for this: a guest who requested an e-invoice cannot reject one.

Reference: Storefront E-Invoice Request — Cancellation

Step 4 — Do not trust the countdown, and do not use LHDN’s portal instead

After this step you will ask early rather than exactly. The hours remaining you see are worked out by your own browser, while the real deadline runs from the moment LHDN validated the document, recorded in universal time, which can be earlier than you expect. A request raised with hours apparently to spare can still come back refused for having passed seventy-two hours, and then the only route is a credit note from the shop. There is a second trap. If you reject the e-invoice directly on LHDN’s own portal instead, the shop is never told: nothing arrives in their system and nothing changes in their lists. Telephone them if you have done that.

Reference: MY E-Invoice Portal Applet — Lifecycle and effects

Step 5 — Name the things only the shop can do

After this step you will stop trying to do their half of the work. The shop resubmits anything LHDN has already refused, and anything held for a reason that is not your own identity. The shop approves and processes your rejection and decides what replaces the cancelled document. Past seventy-two hours the shop issues a credit note, because by then nothing can be cancelled at all. Only the shop can act on a receipt already inside a validated monthly document, and their choices there are narrow. And if their e-invoice page fails every single search with an authorisation error, that is a missing setting on their web store rather than anything you typed. Give them the invoice number, the date and the amount, and let them work.

Reference: MY E-Invoice Portal Applet — Troubleshooting

How the steps fit together

    flowchart TD
  s1["Step 1 — Tell the two kinds of wrong apart"]
  s2["Step 2 — Fix the part that is genuinely yours"]
  s3["Step 3 — Raise a rejection while the clock is still running"]
  s4["Step 4 — Do not trust the countdown, and do not use LHDN's portal instead"]
  s5["Step 5 — Name the things only the shop can do"]
  s1 --> s2
  s2 --> s3
  s3 --> s4
  s4 --> s5
  

Check yourself

Three to five questions on what you just heard. Every correct answer links to the page that makes it correct, so you can check the source, not just the mark.

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