What Happens in an FTA Tax Audit?

Quick answers

What arrives first

A notice, in writing, identifying the tax periods under review and the scope.

It normally comes at least ten business days ahead. Shorter or no notice is possible where evasion is suspected, but that is the exception rather than the ordinary case.

Read the scope carefully. It defines what the audit is about, and it is the reference point for deciding whether a later request is inside or outside what was opened.

What they ask for

The requests are unremarkable and predictable.

• Tax invoices you issued and tax invoices you received
• Credit and debit notes
• VAT returns and the workings behind them
• Sales and purchase ledgers, and general ledger extracts
• Bank statements for business accounts
• Contracts and agreements underlying significant transactions
• Import and export declarations, where relevant
• Customer and supplier records

The pattern is that every figure on a return should trace back to a document. An audit is largely an exercise in following that trail, and it goes smoothly or badly depending on whether the trail exists.

The deadlines are short

Each request carries its own response deadline, commonly five to ten business days.

This is where preparation shows. A business whose records are organised is producing files. A business whose records are scattered is reconstructing them under a deadline while the queries keep arriving, and requesting extensions signals exactly what it appears to signal.

The query phase can run for weeks or months, with each round narrowing on specific transactions.

Your rights during it

These are set out in the law and are worth knowing, because they are rarely volunteered.

You may ask the auditors to show their professional identification.

You may obtain a copy of the audit notification.

You may attend the audit where it is conducted outside the FTA's premises — that is, at your own.

You may obtain copies of any original documents, paper or digital, that are taken during the audit.

And after the assessment, you may access the documents and information the FTA relied on in reaching it.

The window that closes when the notice arrives

If you know something in a filed return is wrong, correcting it before the FTA notifies you of an audit costs materially less than correcting it afterwards.

The moment the notice lands, that option is gone for the periods it covers. This is the strongest practical argument for reviewing your own position periodically rather than waiting to be asked.

What happens at the end

The FTA notifies you of the outcome. If it proposes adjustments, it issues a tax assessment with any penalties.

If you disagree, there is a sequence of steps — an internal review, then reconsideration, then the Tax Disputes Resolution Committee, then the courts. Each stage has its own deadline counted in business days, and missing one generally forfeits the right to move to the next.

These deadlines were revised in the 2026 amendments, so confirm the current period on the FTA portal rather than relying on an older article.

What changes with e-invoicing

Under the e-invoicing mandate, transaction data reaches the FTA close to real time.

That narrows the gap between an error occurring and the authority being able to see it, and it makes selection more data-driven. The practical consequence is that the period in which a business can quietly correct its own position gets shorter, which raises the value of getting things right at the point of invoicing rather than at the point of filing.

What actually makes an audit easy

Records that exist, are complete, and can be produced. Not perfection — completeness.

Every invoice you issued, with its mandatory particulars present. Every expense supported by a supplier invoice carrying a valid TRN. Returns whose figures reconcile to the ledgers behind them. Retention periods observed, including for the years you would rather not think about.

The businesses that find audits stressful are almost never the ones that did something wrong. They are the ones that cannot show what they did.

Where Fatura Go fits

Invoices issued through Fatura Go stay in your account and can be reopened, re-sent or exported at any time, which is the retrievability an audit request tests.

The accountant export produces the underlying invoices, credit notes and expenses for a period in one file, which is closer to the shape of what gets asked for than a folder of individual PDFs.

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