A self-billed e-invoice is an e-invoice issued by the buyer instead of the supplier. LHDN requires it only in a closed list of circumstances — most commonly when you buy from a foreign supplier or pay agents, dealers or distributors. The buyer creates the document under type code 11, submits it to LHDN for validation through MyInvois, and keeps the validated e-invoice as its proof of expense.
This guide is for Malaysian businesses that need to work out whether self-billing applies to them and, where it does, how to get it right: the nine circumstances, who goes in which party block, the deadlines, how to issue one step by step, and a field-by-field worked example.
What is a self-billed e-invoice?
Normally the supplier — the business selling goods or services — issues the invoice to the buyer. In a defined list of circumstances, LHDN requires the buyer to issue it instead. That document is a self-billed e-invoice.
The buyer assumes the role of the supplier: they create the e-invoice, submit it to LHDN for validation, and use the validated document as proof of expense. Once a self-billed e-invoice has been issued for a transaction, the other party is no longer required to issue an e-invoice for it.
Two things follow from that, and both matter more than people expect:
- The buyer is obliged to share the validated self-billed e-invoice with the supplier once it is validated. LHDN currently allows either the validated document itself or a visual representation of it to be shared. The exception is a foreign supplier: for purchases from abroad, LHDN notifies only the Malaysian buyer, and the buyer is not obliged to share the self-billed e-invoice with the foreign seller.
- Self-billed documents use their own document type codes. They are not ordinary invoices with the parties relabelled.
When is a self-billed e-invoice required?
This is an important distinction: self-billing is not something you may adopt because it suits your workflow, and it is not triggered simply because a supplier is small or unregistered. (A foreign supplier does trigger it — but because purchases from foreign suppliers are on LHDN's list, not because the supplier lacks a Malaysian tax identity.) LHDN publishes a closed list of circumstances in Section 8.3 of the e-Invoice Specific Guideline, and self-billing applies only where the transaction falls inside it.
The circumstances currently listed are:
| # | Circumstance | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| a | Payment to agents, dealers or distributors | As defined in Section 83A(4) of the Income Tax Act 1967 |
| b | Goods sold or services rendered by foreign suppliers | The cross-border case most Malaysian businesses meet first |
| c | Profit distribution, e.g. dividend distribution | Certain dividend distributions are outside e-invoicing entirely |
| d | E-commerce transactions | Issued by the platform to the merchant — see below |
| e | Pay-out to betting and gaming winners | Casino and gaming-machine pay-outs are excluded until further notice |
| f | Transactions with individuals who are not conducting a business | Applies only if none of the other circumstances apply |
| g | Interest payment | With a list of exceptions where the supplier issues instead |
| h | Claim, compensation or benefit payments from an insurer's insurance business | |
| i | Capital reduction, share/capital/unit redemption, share buyback, return of capital, liquidation proceeds | Has its own timing-of-issuance rules |
Note the qualifier on (f). "Buying from an individual" is a fallback, not a first resort — if the payment is to an agent or a betting winner, that circumstance governs instead.
Note also the exceptions under (g). Interest charged to the public at large by a financial institution, interest paid by an employee to an employer, interest paid by a foreign payor to a Malaysian taxpayer, interest to a related Malaysian company providing centralised treasury services, and late-payment interest imposed by Malaysian taxpayers are all cases where the supplier issues a normal e-invoice rather than the payer self-billing.
If your transaction is not on this list, you do not self-bill. A Malaysian supplier who has not yet reached their own implementation date issues you a normal receipt; that receipt remains valid proof of expense, and it is not your job to convert it.
Quick check: do you need to self-bill?
Work through the list, not the intuition:
- Do you buy goods or services from suppliers outside Malaysia? → Yes, in scope.
- Do you pay agents, dealers or distributors? → Yes, in scope.
- Do you buy from individuals who are not conducting a business, and no other circumstance applies? → Yes, in scope.
- Do you distribute profits, pay interest outside the listed exceptions, or make insurance claim payments? → Check the specific circumstance.
- Do you only buy from Malaysian businesses that invoice you normally? → No self-billing for those transactions.
And before any of that: confirm that you are within the e-invoicing mandate at all. Applicability depends on your annual turnover or revenue and your implementation phase, with taxpayers below LHDN's turnover exemption threshold currently outside the mandate subject to conditions. E-invoicing in Malaysia: the complete guide sets out where that line currently sits.
Who is the supplier and who is the buyer?
The roles reverse relative to who issues the document, which is where data-entry errors start. LHDN sets them out explicitly:
| Transaction | Supplier (the party in the supplier block) | Issuer of the self-billed e-invoice |
|---|---|---|
| Payment to agents, dealers, distributors | The agent, dealer or distributor | The taxpayer making the payment |
| Goods or services from foreign suppliers | The foreign seller | The Malaysian purchaser |
| Profit distribution | The recipient of the distribution | The taxpayer making the distribution |
| E-commerce | The merchant or service provider (e.g. driver, rider) | The e-commerce or intermediary platform |
| Betting and gaming pay-outs | The recipient of the pay-out | The licensed betting and gaming provider |
| Transactions with individuals not conducting a business | The individual | The person transacting with them |
Read the e-commerce row carefully if you sell on a marketplace. It means the platform issues a self-billed e-invoice to you for what you sold through it. You are the supplier in that document, and you are not the one submitting it. This is covered in more depth in the guide to e-invoicing for e-commerce sellers.
The document type codes: 11 to 14, not 01 to 04
Self-billed documents have their own codes in the MyInvois code list. Using a normal code for a self-billed transaction, or a self-billed code for a normal one, is a straightforward rejection.
| Code | Document | Issued by |
|---|---|---|
| 01 | Invoice | Supplier |
| 02 | Credit Note | Supplier |
| 03 | Debit Note | Supplier |
| 04 | Refund Note | Supplier |
| 11 | Self-billed Invoice | Buyer |
| 12 | Self-billed Credit Note | Buyer |
| 13 | Self-billed Debit Note | Buyer |
| 14 | Self-billed Refund Note | Buyer |
So the self-billed family mirrors the normal family one for one. If you self-billed a purchase from a foreign supplier under code 11 and later need to reduce the amount, the adjustment is a self-billed credit note under code 12 — not a code 02 credit note, and not a new code 11 for a negative amount. The same reference rules apply as for ordinary adjustments: the document carries the IRBM Unique Identifier Number of the original e-invoice it adjusts. The mechanics are the same as for supplier-issued notes, covered in credit notes and debit notes in MyInvois.
Codes 02, 03 and 04 are widely mislabelled online as the self-billed codes. They are not; they are the supplier-issued credit, debit and refund notes.
When must a self-billed e-invoice be issued?
The e-Invoice Specific Guideline sets explicit deadlines for four situations:
| Situation | Issue the self-billed e-invoice |
|---|---|
| Importing goods from a foreign supplier | By the end of the second month following the month in which customs clearance is obtained |
| Importing services from a foreign supplier | By the end of the month following the month of payment or of receiving the supplier's invoice, whichever is earlier |
| Capital reduction, redemption, share buyback, return of capital or liquidation proceeds (circumstance i) | With a written agreement: the agreement date if government or state-government approval is not required; otherwise the approval date, or the date the last condition is satisfied if approval is conditional. Without a written agreement: the completion date. |
| Consolidated self-billed e-invoices, where consolidation is allowed | Monthly, within seven calendar days after the month end |
For the other circumstances, the guideline says the process follows the ordinary e-invoice workflow — the document is created and submitted for validation when the transaction is concluded, as with a normal e-invoice.
If you import taxable services on which service tax applies, the service tax amount goes into the self-billed e-invoice as well.
How to issue a self-billed e-invoice, step by step
- Confirm the circumstance. Check the transaction against the list above. If it is not on the list, you do not self-bill.
- Collect the other party's details. Take them from the supplier's own invoice, receipt or bill where you have one, or ask for them. For foreign suppliers, missing details have defined fallbacks — see the example below.
- Create the document with the self-billed type code —
11for an invoice, or12,13or14for an adjustment. Put the other party in the supplier block and your own business in the buyer block. - Submit it for validation. Self-billed e-invoices go through the same channels as any other: the MyInvois Portal or the API. You may submit yourself or authorise an intermediary. For a signed API version, an authorised provider may use its own credentials and certificate.
- Share the validated document with the supplier — unless the supplier is foreign, where sharing is not required. A visual representation shared from the portal carries a QR code; if you share one generated from your own system, make sure it includes the QR code too.
- Keep it as proof of expense. The validated self-billed e-invoice is what supports the expense for tax purposes.
Self-billed e-invoice template: a worked example for a foreign supplier
The supplier block when the other party is abroad
The practical difficulty in self-billing is that the party in the supplier block often has no Malaysian tax identity. LHDN provides general TINs for exactly this:
| General TIN | Use |
|---|---|
EI00000000010 | Malaysian individual providing only a MyKad/MyTentera number; non-Malaysian individual providing only MyPR/MyKAS; supplier's TIN in a consolidated self-billed e-invoice |
EI00000000030 | Foreign supplier's TIN where it is unavailable or not provided, and for non-Malaysian individual suppliers who provide only a passport number — this is the self-billed case |
Use EI00000000030 for the foreign supplier in a self-billed e-invoice where you genuinely do not have their TIN. Where you do have it, use it. Alongside the general TIN you still supply the supplier's name, address, country and — for an individual — their passport number.
Your Malaysian business remains the buyer and the self-billing issuer; an authorised intermediary may submit on its behalf.
Field by field: a foreign service provider
Suppose a Malaysian company pays a consultancy in the United Kingdom for advice and receives the consultancy's invoice. The company issues a self-billed e-invoice under code 11, completing the supplier block from the UK invoice. The Specific Guideline's instructions for the supplier fields are:
| Field | What to enter for the foreign supplier |
|---|---|
| Supplier's name | The foreign business's name (or, for an individual, the full name as per passport) |
| Supplier's TIN | Their TIN if available; otherwise EI00000000030 |
| Registration / identification number | Their business registration or passport number; NA if not available or not provided |
| Supplier's address | Their business address (or residential address for an individual) |
| Supplier's contact number | Their contact number |
| Supplier's SST registration number | Where applicable; otherwise NA |
| Supplier's MSIC code | Where applicable; otherwise 00000 |
| Supplier's business activity description | Where applicable; otherwise NA |
| Classification | A 3-digit classification code from LHDN's catalogue |
The buyer block holds the Malaysian company's own details, and the rest of the document — line items, amounts, tax — is completed as for any e-invoice. If service tax on imported taxable services applies, it is included. Once validated, the company keeps the self-billed e-invoice as its proof of expense; it does not need to send it to the UK consultancy.
Consolidation and self-billed e-invoices
Consolidation — aggregating a month of transactions into one document — does not generally apply to self-billed e-invoices. LHDN allows it only in four cases:
- transactions with individuals who are not conducting a business
- interest payments to the public at large, whether the recipient is a business or an individual
- claim, compensation or benefit payments from an insurer's insurance business to individuals not conducting a business, to the government, a government authority, a state government or a state authority
- self-billed circumstances involving a taxpayer's overseas branches or offices
Where consolidation is allowed, the timing matches ordinary consolidated e-invoices: aggregate monthly, and submit within seven calendar days after the month end. In the consolidated self-billed e-invoice, the supplier's name is entered as "General Public" and the supplier's TIN as EI00000000010.
Everything else is issued per transaction.
There is one significant qualification here. During the interim relaxation period that follows each implementation phase, LHDN allows taxpayers to issue consolidated self-billed e-invoices for all the self-billed circumstances in Section 8.3. For taxpayers whose implementation date is 1 January 2026 or 1 July 2026, that relaxation currently runs until 31 December 2027. If you are in that group, the per-transaction rule above is where you need to arrive, not necessarily where you must be today — see what happens if you miss the e-invoicing deadline for how the relaxation period works.
Common mistakes
Assuming self-billing applies because the supplier has not implemented e-invoicing. It does not. Suppliers below their implementation date, or exempt from e-invoicing, issue ordinary receipts, and those receipts are valid proof of expense.
Using codes 02, 03 or 04 for self-billed documents. They belong to codes 11, 12, 13 and 14.
Filling the party blocks as if it were your own sale. In a self-billed e-invoice the party you bought from goes in the supplier block, and your business goes in the buyer block — even though you are the one submitting.
Not sharing the validated document with the supplier. The obligation to share sits with the buyer who issued it — except where the supplier is foreign, where sharing is not required.
Consolidating self-billed documents outside the four permitted cases. Once the relaxation period ends, that becomes a per-transaction requirement.
Forgetting that the e-commerce platform self-bills you. If you sell through a marketplace, self-billed e-invoices are something you receive and reconcile, not something you issue for those sales.
Related guides
- E-invoicing in Malaysia: a complete guide — the requirement as a whole
- LHDN e-invoice compliance: requirements and checklist — preparing for self-billing alongside everything else
- Credit notes and debit notes in MyInvois — the mechanics behind codes 12 and 13
- E-invoicing for e-commerce sellers — when the platform self-bills you
Rules on self-billing are stated in the LHDN e-Invoice Guideline and the e-Invoice Specific Guideline, both of which are revised regularly. Verify your specific circumstance against the current versions on the LHDN e-Invoice microsite before relying on it.