As of 13 August 2026, AI can only partly add the correct UK VAT rate to your invoice.

What to actually do

1. Hand it to a person

   The route this page recommends

   A person who owns the outcome does this end to end, worth it when the failure is dear.

2. Use a tool built for this

   Second choice

3. Do it yourself

   The distant third

   A chat interface, chat-fluent skill, and roughly 30 minutes until you can act on the result.

   How to actually do it

   1. Open the GOV.UK VAT rates and VAT place of supply guidance pages and keep them available for comparison.
   2. Gather the invoice date, detailed description of the goods or services, net amount, customer location, customer business or consumer status, VAT number and your own VAT registration status.
   3. Paste the supplied prompt into a chatbot and replace every bracketed slot with the gathered facts, including any sector-specific or reverse-charge information.
   4. Paste the chatbot's proposed treatment and cited GOV.UK links into your invoice or accounting system only after checking that the goods or services description matches the guidance category.
   5. Recalculate the VAT amount from the net amount and proposed rate, then compare the rate, amount, invoice wording and any reverse-charge instruction with the current GOV.UK pages.
   6. Send an unresolved classification, exemption, place-of-supply or reverse-charge case to your accountant or VAT specialist before issuing the invoice.

   Prompt

   Help me choose the VAT treatment for this UK invoice, but do not guess. This is not professional advice. Use current GOV.UK guidance where available, cite the relevant GOV.UK page, and clearly flag anything that needs an accountant or VAT specialist.
   
   Invoice date: [DATE]
   My business VAT registration status: [VAT REGISTERED, NOT VAT REGISTERED, OR UNSURE]
   My business location: [UK COUNTRY OR OTHER COUNTRY]
   Customer location and status: [UK COUNTRY OR OTHER COUNTRY, BUSINESS OR CONSUMER, AND ANY VAT NUMBER]
   Goods or services supplied: [DETAILED DESCRIPTION]
   Where the goods or services are supplied or used: [DETAILS]
   Any relevant sector, exemption, reduced-rate rule, domestic reverse charge or place-of-supply fact: [DETAILS OR NONE]
   Net amount and currency: [AMOUNT]
   
   First, list any missing facts that could change the result. If the facts are sufficient, state the recommended VAT treatment, the VAT rate, the VAT amount and the invoice wording or fields needed. Distinguish standard-rated, reduced-rated, zero-rated, exempt, outside-the-scope and reverse-charge treatment where relevant. Do not invent a rate, classification or customer detail. If more than one treatment is plausible, show the alternatives and explain exactly what fact decides between them. Finish with a short checklist of what I must compare against current GOV.UK guidance before issuing the invoice.

   Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.