New Cabinet Decision updates e-invoicing administrative penalties

On 30 October 2026 the Ministry of Finance announced a new Cabinet Decision on administrative penalties for the UAE e-invoicing framework. It replaces Cabinet Decision No. 106 of 2025.

The Ministry's announcement sets out three points:

• For an issuer or recipient that does not comply with the e-invoicing implementation requirements, the penalty is AED 5,000 for the first violation. A further AED 5,000 applies for each month, or part of a month, in which the non-compliance continues. The total is capped at AED 50,000 in any twelve consecutive months.
• The penalty under the previous decision for failing to notify the Federal Tax Authority of a system failure has been removed.
• Where the same person is the issuer, the recipient, or both, for the same violation, only one administrative penalty is imposed.

The announcement does not give the number of the new Cabinet Decision, so we have not quoted one. It also does not say how the new penalty relates to the per-invoice and appointment penalties that earlier press coverage described, so businesses should not assume those figures still apply until the full text of the decision is read.

The announcement came the day the deadline passed for businesses with revenue of AED 50 million or more to appoint a service provider. Those businesses are due to go live on 1 January 2027. Other businesses have until 31 March 2027 to appoint a provider and go live by 1 July 2027.

For a UAE business, the practical point is that penalties now build up month by month and are capped, which makes the cost of delay easier to estimate, but a business that has not yet appointed a provider should still do so promptly and check the full decision with its adviser.