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Italy Reports €13.5 Billion Rise in Electronically Declared Retail Sales

E-Invoicing
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Susie West
Oct 20, 2026

Retailers in Italy declared €13.5 billion more in taxable sales between January and September 2026 than in the same period last year, a rise of 4.1%. The Agenzia delle Entrate shared the figures with Italy’s Court of Auditors, nine months after businesses were required to link their card payment terminals to their electronic cash registers.

The Back Story

Until this year, a shop in Italy could take a card payment without issuing an electronic receipt, so the sale never reached the daily takings data sent to the tax authority. Reports point to frequent cases where banks recorded electronic transactions that had no matching receipt from the cash register. ilfoglio

Since 1st January 2026, businesses have had to pair each POS terminal with their cash register. The connection is registered online through the tax authority’s portal, so no new hardware is needed. Once the two are linked, the Agenzia delle Entrate can match every card payment against the receipts a business transmits, making unrecorded card sales much easier to spot. Cash sales aren’t directly affected. cloudbeds

The pairing service opened on 5th March, with an initial deadline of 20th April, so any effect would have been weaker in the first quarter. cloudbeds

Considerations

  • Value outpaced volume: Declared turnover rose by 4.1%, while the number of receipts grew by only 1.9%. This fits with inflation, but also with higher-value card sales that previously went unrecorded. borsaitaliana
  • Retail stands out: Domestic VAT growth in commerce reached 6.2%, compared with 1.7% in private services and 1.8% in industry. Inflation affects every sector, so a retail-specific rise points towards the link, although it isn’t proof. borsaitaliana
  • Turnover, not tax: The €13.5 billion is a taxable base rather than tax collected, even though some reports have described it as revenue.
  • Cause unconfirmed: The Court of Auditors says inflation and changing consumption may have contributed, and it wants VAT returns and annual declarations analysed before drawing conclusions. borsaitaliana

Although this is a retail measure rather than B2B e-invoicing, it shows how tax authorities are increasingly matching payment data against electronically reported sales.

Sources: Il Fatto Quotidiano, Court of Auditors findings, 12th October 2026 | Teleborsa, 13th October 2026 | VATCalc, analysis, 18th October 2026