Norway on the SAF-T requirement

The new implementation date is expected to be 1 January 2018, although it has not been confirmed yet.

What is SAF-T?

SAF-T stands for Standard Audit File for Tax reporting. It was developed by the OECD to give tax authorities a template to retrieve business accounting data during a tax audit. This template would be the same in all OECD countries, hence making it easier for large multinationals to adapt to data requests. However, in practice, each country is introducing deviations from the proposed SAF-T project so it is no longer a standard file that can be used in a multinational environment.

SAF-T and other EU countries

SAF-T for audit purposes should be distinguished from SAF-T as a periodic obligation. Countries like France or Norway introduced this requirement only in the case of a tax audit, whereas other jurisdictions like Portugal or Poland require all VAT registered businesses to submit a SAF-T file on a monthly or quarterly basis (in Portugal, it is not mandatory for non-established companies).

The authorities published a manual on Norwegian SAF-T requirements in English with detailed IT and content instructions.