A new NT$800 (US$28.64) prize will be added to the bimonthly uniform invoice lottery for holders of e-invoices stored online, starting from the next draw scheduled for Sept. 25, the Ministry of Finance said Wednesday.

For holders of e-invoices issued in July and August, 100,000 additional winning serial numbers will be drawn for the new NT$800 prize, the ministry announced during a press conference in Taipei.

Before the introduction of the new prize, the ministry had already introduced dedicated prizes for digitally stored e-invoices, including 30 NT$1 million prizes, 16,000 NT$2,000 prizes and 1 million NT$500 prizes.

In addition, online e-invoice holders are still eligible to take part in the bimonthly lottery draw for both paper receipts and e-invoices, with prizes ranging between NT$200 and NT$10 million.

If an online e-invoice wins two prizes, the holder will receive the one with the higher value.

The ministry will make payments of NT$642 million for online e-invoices alone as part of the bimonthly uniform invoice lottery, which was initially held to encourage people to get a receipt so the government can track taxable transactions and collect the 5 percent business tax from vendors.

The new NT$800 prize is another push to encourage consumers to use an app to store their e-invoices. The ministry’s own e-invoice app has had more than 3.4 million downloads since it was released in 2019. There are other privately developed apps available that serve the same purpose.

According to the ministry, the amount of digitally stored e-invoices has grown from 31 percent of all e-invoices in late 2020 to 40 percent as of the end of July.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel