What Is CBMS? Nepal's IRD Billing System Explained

When bills must reach CBMS

For cloud billing software, the procedure requires bill data to reach CBMS at the time the bill is issued. That is why approved cloud systems send each bill automatically as part of issuing it, rather than in a batch at the end of the day or month.

Every record carries an Is_realtime flag. A bill that reached CBMS when it was issued is marked real-time; one that was sent later, for example after an internet outage, is marked as reported late. Good billing software shows you which bills are which, and retries anything that failed, so nothing is left unreported.

What CBMS receives

For every bill, CBMS receives the details a VAT invoice already carries:

• the seller's PAN, the fiscal year and the bill number
• the buyer's name and PAN
• the bill date, amount, discount, taxable amount, VAT and total
• whether the bill was reported in real time

Sales returns and credit notes go to CBMS too, through a separate bill-return channel, so IRD sees both the original bill and any correction against it.

The 20-field Standard View (Annex 5)

Alongside CBMS reporting, the procedure (Annex 5) requires billing software to keep a table or materialized view with a fixed set of attributes, which can be viewed and printed as a report. IRD officers use it during inspections. The 20 attributes, in order, are:

1. Fiscal_Year
2. Bill_no
3. Customer_name
4. Customer_pan
5. Bill_Date
6. Amount
7. Discount
8. Taxable_Amount
9. Tax_Amount
10. Total_Amount
11. Sync_with_IRD
12. IS_Bill_Printed
13. Is_bill_Active
14. Printed_Time
15. Entered_By
16. Printed_by
17. Is_realtime
18. Payment_Method
19. VAT_Refund_Amount
20. Transaction_Id

If a vendor cannot show you this report on screen, ask why: it is one of the first things an inspection looks at.

Cancellations and returns

Under the procedure, data that has been entered cannot simply be deleted. A wrong bill is cancelled with a reason, which marks it inactive (Is_bill_Active) and keeps it on record, and goods returned or amounts reduced are handled with a sales return or credit note. Each kind of correction has its own register, so the trail from the original bill to the correction is always visible.

What your billing software must do

To work with CBMS properly, billing software needs to:

• be listed with IRD by its producer, with a billing permit issued for your business
• send each bill, sales return and credit note to CBMS when it is issued
• show which bills synced in real time, which were late, and retry failures
• keep the Annex 5 Standard View and the Sales and Purchase Books in IRD's format
• export registers to Excel and PDF for your VAT return and your auditor

Our buyer's checklist for IRD-approved billing software walks through every requirement to check before you choose a system.

What this means for security companies

Security and manpower companies bill the same clients every month, and clients often deduct TDS before paying. With CBMS, each of those monthly bills has to be issued from approved software and reported as it is issued, and the TDS a client withholds has to be matched to the receipt.

StrataMax Billing is IRD-certified billing software built for this: last month's client bills are reissued as one batch, every bill and credit note reaches CBMS in real time with a live sync status, client TDS is recorded on each receipt, and the Sales Book, Purchase Book, VAT reports and Standard View export to Excel or PDF.

Frequently asked questions