Net, VAT, and total — what Hemma uses where

01What's going on

When an invoice or quote arrives, Hemma's AI reads each line item and pulls out the net amount, the VAT amount, the VAT rate (commonly 21% or 6% for renovation), and the total (incl-VAT). Where the document only shows two of those, Hemma derives the third when it can.

All four show up on the invoice detail page so you can verify what was extracted. But for everything downstream — budget tracking, contractor outstanding totals, the Mark-as-paid amount — Hemma uses total (incl-VAT) as the canonical number.

02Why incl-VAT, not net

Most homeowners think in incl-VAT. That is what comes out of your bank account. That is what your contractor quoted you over coffee. That is what your budget Excel almost certainly contains.

Holding net as canonical would force the budget to be split into "what the work costs" and "what the VAT bill is" — a layer of bookkeeping that does not match how anyone we talked to thinks about their build. So Hemma sticks with what is intuitive: the total you actually pay.

The net and VAT numbers are kept on the line item and shown on the detail page so your accountant has them when they need them. They are not used in any budget calculation.

03Where each number shows up

• Invoice detail page → Header — the total (incl-VAT) in big type. The number you see when you glance at the file.
• Invoice detail page → Line items — each line shows its own total, with net and VAT visible if they were on the document.
• Invoice detail page → Payment card — the amount on the QR code and the Mark-as-paid amount. Always incl-VAT. See paying an invoice with the QR code.
• Budget → Invoiced column — incl-VAT amounts of every linked invoice line, summed. See reading your budget status.
• Budget → Quoted column — same logic, on the quote side.
• Contractor view → Outstanding — invoices not yet paid, totals incl-VAT. See tracking what's still owed per contractor.
• Linking screen → Default amount — the line item's total fills the amount field on the linking card. Override if you are splitting.

04The 21% vs. 6% case

Belgian renovation has two main VAT rates:

• 21% — new construction, most building materials.
• 6% — renovation work on a private home older than ten years, under the conditions defined by FOD Financiën.

A single invoice can mix both rates — for example, a contractor who installs new bathroom plumbing in a 25-year-old house: the labour at 6%, some new components at 21%. Hemma extracts the rate per line item, so a mixed invoice shows up correctly. The line totals (incl-VAT) are summed into the budget; the rates themselves are stored for the audit trail but do not change the numbers.

If your contractor put everything at 21% and you suspect 6% applied, that is a conversation with the contractor — Hemma reads what is on the document, it does not second-guess the rate.

05Common questions

The net + VAT does not equal the total exactly. Rounding. Belgian invoices are typically rounded to the cent on each line, then the totals are recomputed, and the sum can drift by a cent or two. Hemma flags differences over a couple of cents but treats single-cent gaps as normal.

Hemma extracted the wrong VAT rate. Open the invoice, expand the line item, and edit the rate inline. The total stays the same; the rate is a label, not a multiplier. See the AI extracted the wrong amount or contractor.

My budget is in net amounts because that's how the architect tracks it. Set your budgeted numbers as net amounts. Linked invoices will still arrive as incl-VAT totals — the easiest workaround is to subtract VAT from your linked amount manually when you confirm the link. Long term, treat the budget as one or the other consistently; mixing leads to the kind of arithmetic in my budget total looks wrong.

Does Hemma report VAT to FOD Financiën for me? No. Hemma is a project administrator, not a tax tool. The numbers are accurate and exportable so your accountant can do the BTW return — but the filing itself is theirs.

06What if it goes wrong

• The total does not match your contractor's stated amount? See the AI extracted the wrong amount or contractor.
• The budget invoiced total does not match the sum of invoices? See my budget total looks wrong.

07Related

• Reading your budget status
• Linking an invoice or quote to a budget line
• Marking an invoice as paid
• The AI extracted the wrong amount or contractor