Partial VAT Refund Approvals

The notification for a partial approval is the most instructive document the FTA will ever send you: it lists exactly which lines were disallowed and why. Read it as a priced audit of your preparation. Blocked input tax disallowed means the Article 53 Executive Regulation review was skipped. Invalid invoices mean TRN validation was skipped. Recomputed apportionment means the workings were wrong or absent. Each disallowance maps to a specific preparation failure, and the amounts attached tell you what each failure cost. File the notification where the preparation checklist lives, because that is where it belongs.

Disallowances cluster predictably. Blocked categories claimed in error are the most clear-cut: the law excludes them and no argument revives them. Invoice defects, missing TRNs, wrong particulars, unregistered suppliers, remove the related input tax entirely. Attribution errors, exempt supplies treated as taxable or mixed overheads fully claimed, are recomputed on the correct basis. Timing issues, invoices claimed in the wrong period, are moved or removed. Understanding the category matters because the remedy differs: blocked lines stay out permanently, while timing and evidence issues may be curable in a corrected claim.

Accept the partial approval where the disallowances are correct; the approved portion is then repaid after netting, and the lessons improve the next claim. Challenge where the FTA's decision is wrong on the facts, for example disallowing an invoice that is in fact valid, or on the law, for example misapplying the blocking provisions. The challenge route is reconsideration within 20 business days of the notification, engaging precisely with the stated reasons. Do not challenge correct disallowances out of frustration; the reconsideration forum decides on merit, and meritless challenges waste the window and the credibility.

Some disallowed amounts are recoverable in a corrected claim: timing adjustments can be claimed in the right period, and evidence gaps can be cured where the underlying input tax was genuinely recoverable. Blocked input tax and exempt attribution are not recoverable in any period; remove them permanently. For the curable portion, correct the return if needed through voluntary disclosure, rebuild the schedules, and file the corrected position. Do not simply refile the same lines and hope for a different reviewer; address the stated reason for each disallowance explicitly.

Convert the notification into preparation upgrades: add the missed check to the pre-filing checklist, brief the purchase ledger team on the classification error, and set the TRN validation or blocking review that was missing. The businesses with the cleanest refund histories are not those that never face disallowances but those that face each one once. A partial approval, read properly, is the cheapest tax training the business will ever receive, because the tuition is priced in disallowed dirhams and the curriculum is written specifically for your operation.