How to invoice without GST when you are not registered

If you’re not registered for GST, head the document “Invoice”, not “Tax invoice”, show no GST line and no GST amount, and make the total the price you agreed. That’s the whole change. Everything else on the document - your name, your ABN, the date, what you sold, the amount, how to pay - stays exactly the same as any other invoice.

The confusion is worth clearing up, because both mistakes cost money. Charging GST you aren’t registered to collect is a real problem. So is heading an ordinary invoice “tax invoice” and letting a customer claim a credit that was never there.

General information, not tax advice. The ATO is the authority - see ato.gov.au or ask a registered tax or BAS agent.

The short answer, in one document

A plain invoice from an unregistered sole trader looks like this: your trading name and contact details at the top, your ABN under them, an invoice number, the issue date, a due date, a line or two describing the work, and a total. No “GST” column. No “plus GST”. No 10% anywhere.

If the price you quoted was $1,800, the invoice says $1,800 and the customer pays $1,800. There’s nothing to add and nothing to break out, because there’s no GST in the transaction at all.

Many people add a short line such as “No GST has been charged on this invoice.” Nothing requires it, but it pre-empts the question from customers who assume every invoice has GST buried in it, and it saves an email.

Why “tax invoice” is the wrong heading

A tax invoice is a specific legal document. Its job is to be the evidence a GST-registered buyer needs to claim a GST credit, which is why the ATO’s tax invoices page lists 7 details one has to contain, starting with the fact that the document is intended to be a tax invoice. Sales of $1,000 or more add the buyer’s identity or ABN. The complete list is in what must legally be on an Australian tax invoice.

If you aren’t registered, none of that applies to you, and using the heading anyway causes a downstream mess. A business customer whose bookkeeper sees “Tax invoice” may treat your $1,800 as $1,636.36 plus $163.64 of GST and claim the $163.64 back. There was no GST, so the credit isn’t theirs to claim, and it has to be unwound once someone notices. You’ll be reissuing the document, and the person who has to fix their BAS will remember.

The same applies to the “Total price includes GST” statement. It’s a shortcut the ATO allows on a tax invoice when the GST is exactly one-eleventh of the total. On a document from an unregistered business it’s simply untrue.

What to include anyway

Dropping GST doesn’t mean dropping rigour. The fields that get an invoice paid have nothing to do with GST:

Your ABN. Not compulsory, but where a business pays another business more than $75 excluding GST and no ABN is quoted, the payer generally has to withhold tax at the top rate, currently 47%, under the ATO’s withholding from suppliers rules; its statement by a supplier page is where that percentage is published. Having an ABN and no GST registration is an entirely normal combination.

A unique invoice number, never reused, and one you can find things by later.

A specific due date, not “payable on receipt”. A date can go in a calendar; a phrase can’t.

Bank details and a payment reference, exactly as the bank holds the account name.

A description a stranger can approve. The person paying is often not the person who hired you.

The mechanics of numbering, terms and sending are covered in how to invoice as a sole trader and apply unchanged whether or not you’re registered.

The threshold that changes all of this

Registration stops being optional at a turnover figure. The ATO requires registration when your GST turnover - broadly, gross income from all your businesses minus GST - reaches $75,000 or more, and requires you to register within 21 days of crossing it. A non-profit organisation has a different threshold, and taxi, limousine and ride-sourcing drivers have to register regardless of turnover. Check the current figures and how turnover is worked out on the ATO’s registering for GST page.

Below the threshold, registering is optional. It’s a genuine trade-off rather than an obvious win. Registering lets you claim GST credits on business purchases, which matters if you buy a lot of materials, tools or stock. It also adds 10% to your prices for customers who can’t claim it back - households, mostly - and commits you to reporting GST on a cycle the ATO sets. That cycle may be monthly, quarterly or annually depending on turnover, and a business that registers voluntarily below the threshold may be able to report annually rather than quarterly. If your customers are all GST-registered businesses, the 10% washes through and registration is close to price-neutral. If your customers are consumers, it’s a price rise or a margin cut.

Watching turnover so you register in time

The threshold is not an end-of-year calculation. The ATO’s registering for GST page says to check each month whether you’ve reached the threshold or are likely to exceed it, because it’s forward-looking as well as backward-looking: a business that expects to reach the threshold in its first year is required to register from the start.

Missing it is expensive in a specific way. If registration was required and you didn’t register, you may have to pay GST on sales made since the date you were required to register, even if you never included GST in those prices. That comes out of margin you already spent, and penalties and interest may apply on top. Backdating a registration is possible but, per the same page, limited to 4 years.

The practical version: once your last twelve months of invoicing is close enough to $75,000 that a good quarter would take you over it, a recurring calendar reminder to check the running total is worth more than an annual one, and a registered tax or BAS agent is easier to talk to before you cross than after.

What changes on the day you register

Three things, all at once. Your invoices become tax invoices and pick up the extra required fields. Your prices need a decision - absorb the 10% or add it - and that decision is best made before the next quote goes out, not after. And you start lodging a BAS, which means your bookkeeping has to be current on a quarterly rhythm rather than an annual one.

None of it is difficult, but all of it is easier when the invoices you issued beforehand are already complete and findable. GST registration and BAS for sole traders walks through the transition in more detail.

How Apsis helps

Apsis stores your trading name, ABN, contact details and payment terms once and prints them on every quote and invoice, so the fields that matter are there whether or not GST is in the picture. Invoices are numbered sequentially, carry an issue date and a specific due date, and the list shows what’s paid and what’s outstanding. Quotes, invoices, and expenses with receipt uploads are all on the free plan, which covers 5 clients and 20 invoices a month, so the record of what you invoiced and what you spent stays in one place while you’re watching the turnover figure. If you do register later, the tax module on the paid plan adds a GST and BAS view over the same data.