Tax Identification Number in Georgia: A Guide for Foreigners
A tax residency certificate application, a landlord register form or the annual income tax return asks for your Georgian taxpayer identification number, and you discover you do not have one. For a foreigner that number is 9 digits, assigned by the Revenue Service when you go on tax registration. Here is who is obliged to hold one, what the Revenue Service asks for and what the number does not give you.
- A foreigner's Georgian taxpayer identification number is 9 digits. A Georgian citizen is assigned the personal number printed on their ID card instead.
- An individual without Georgian citizenship is obliged to apply to the Revenue Service for tax registration once a tax or customs obligation arises.
- You file an application on the form of Annex No I-01 with an identity document, and registration is carried out no later than 5 working days after that.
- What triggers it is an ordinary filing obligation: the annual income tax return due by 31 March, the small business monthly return due by the 15th, VAT registration once supplies pass GEL 100,000, or a tax residency certificate application.
- Holding the number is not tax residency. Residency turns on 183 days or more of actual presence in Georgia, and the number decides nothing about what you owe.
What a Georgian tax identification number is
The number is how the Revenue Service identifies a taxpayer on every return, payment and application. For an individual without Georgian citizenship it is a 9-digit identification number, assigned under Article 66 of the Tax Code.
A Georgian citizen, an individual entrepreneur included, is assigned the personal number shown in their ID card, and a holder of a neutral identity card or neutral travel document is assigned the number in that document. A Georgian citizen who is not an individual entrepreneur may quote that personal number when declaring a tax or customs obligation and when paying tax at a bank, without going through tax registration procedures at all.
That is the difference a foreigner runs into. There is no Georgian number already attached to you, so one has to be assigned, and the instruction obliges an individual without Georgian citizenship to apply for tax registration when a tax or customs obligation arises.
Who needs a Georgian tax number
The trigger is a tax obligation, not how long you have been in the country, and these are the situations that produce one.
- You file an annual income tax return. Residents with income that was not taxed at source, and non-residents with Georgian-source income that was not taxed at source, file the annual income tax return by 31 March, and that return is filed under a taxpayer number.
- You are setting up as an individual entrepreneur. Registration in the Registry of Entrepreneurs and Non-Entrepreneurial (Non-Commercial) Legal Entities comes first, and the application to the tax authority for the 1% small business regime follows on its own form.
- You have crossed the VAT threshold. Once your VAT taxable supplies pass GEL 100,000 over any run of 12 consecutive calendar months, a rolling window rather than a calendar year, you have 2 business days to apply for VAT registration.
- You are asking for a tax residency certificate. The application is filed electronically and carries your taxpayer number with your name and address, so you cannot start it without one.
- You are letting residential property. The Revenue Service register of persons letting residential space is applied for on its own form, which asks for a personal number, and for a foreigner that means the 9-digit taxpayer number, because entry in the register is not itself a ground for registering the applicant as a taxpayer.
How to get a Georgian tax number
Order No 996 of the Minister of Finance, the tax administration instruction, sets no calendar deadline for registering. What starts the clock is the obligation itself, a tax or a customs one, so the date to work back from is that obligation and not a filing season.
Say you move to Tbilisi in February 2026 and work from there for clients abroad, with nobody withholding tax on what you invoice. Work you do from Georgia is a service rendered in Georgia, so the income is Georgian-source from the first invoice, and the annual income tax return covering 2026 falls due by 31 March 2027. The obligation arises with the income. Tax registration does not release a taxpayer from obligations that arose before it, so registering in March 2027 does not move the 2026 liability.
You file an application on the form of Annex No I-01 together with an identity document. An individual who has no place of residence in Georgia may apply as well, and the form then states the address abroad among the other details.
Where a representative registers you, a power of attorney issued by you and certified by a notary is filed, or another document the Civil Code of Georgia treats as equivalent to one. No apostille or legalisation is required for that power of attorney: the instruction asks for apostille or legalisation on the founding documents of a foreign enterprise, not on an individual's authority to act.
| Route | What is filed | Who it is open to |
|---|---|---|
| At the Revenue Service yourself | Annex No I-01 application and an identity document | Any individual without a Georgian number |
| Through a representative | The same, plus a power of attorney certified by a notary | Any individual, with no apostille on that power of attorney |
| Video call or remote identification | The service itself, plus the Annex No I-01 application where the tax authority asks for it | An individual who is not an individual entrepreneur |
Tax registration is carried out no later than 5 working days from the filing of the application. A taxpayer certificate on the form of Annex No I-03 is issued afterwards, and the application data are entered in the unified register of tax registration.
Registration can be refused where you already hold an identification number. It can also be refused where the application data do not match the documents filed or the documents are incomplete, but only after you have been given a deadline to put that right, and a reasoned refusal is notified in writing within 5 working days.
There is one route where the number arrives attached to something else. A foreigner granted Georgian residency as a high net worth individual, under Order No 60 of the Minister of Finance, receives a 9-digit taxpayer number with the residency certificate if they do not already hold one.
Breach of the rules Georgian legislation establishes for registration as a taxpayer carries a fine of GEL 500 under Article 273 of the Tax Code. The returns that fell due while you were unregistered carry their own fine on top of it: 5% of the tax due on a return filed up to 2 months late, and 10% after that.
A tax number is not tax residency
The number identifies you. It settles nothing about what you owe, and the two questions are decided by different rules.
Residency is decided by days. An individual is resident for the whole tax year if actually present in Georgia for 183 days or more in any continuous 12-calendar-month period ending in that tax year, under Article 34 of the Tax Code. Any part of a day spent in Georgia counts as a full day, and status is set for each tax period separately, so the days that made you resident in one period are not counted again for the next.
What you pay then follows from that status and from where the income comes from. A non-resident pays Georgian income tax only on Georgian-source income, and income of a resident individual that is not Georgian-source income is exempt. A taxpayer number sits on both sides of that line and moves neither: work you do from Georgia for clients abroad is Georgian-source income whether or not you hold one.
The two meet in one place. An application for a tax residency certificate states your Georgian taxpayer identification number, so the number comes first and the certificate second.
If you have been given a Georgian tax number and are not sure what it obliges you to file, you can send us your situation and the year, and David Sisvadze sets out what applies to you in a written opinion he signs.
What you file with the number
Every return you file carries the number, and having it changes none of the dates. They land on 3 recurring dates whatever month your number was issued in: the 15th for the monthly returns, 31 March for the annual one and 1 November for property tax.
| Return | Who files it | Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| Annual income tax return | Residents with income not taxed at source, and non-residents with Georgian-source income not taxed at source | 31 March |
| Small business monthly return | Individual entrepreneurs holding small business status | 15th of the following month |
| Employer withholding return | Anyone paying salaries | 15th of the following month |
| VAT return | VAT-registered persons, on a calendar month period | 15th of the following month |
| Property tax return | Individuals with a liability left after the reliefs | 1 November |
Tax under the annual return is paid by the same day the return is due, so 31 March is a payment date as well as a filing date. A deadline whose last day is a non-working day holds over to the close of the next working day, and you can still file electronically up to 24:00 on that day.
Frequently asked questions
Does a Georgian tax number make me a tax resident?
No. Residency is decided by days: 183 days or more of actual presence in Georgia in any continuous 12-calendar-month period ending in the tax year. Any part of a day in Georgia counts as a full day, and the test is applied to each tax period on its own, so days already used are not counted again. The number identifies you to the Revenue Service and says nothing about status.
How many digits is a Georgian taxpayer identification number?
For an individual without Georgian citizenship it is 9 digits. A Georgian citizen, an individual entrepreneur included, uses the personal number shown in their ID card instead, and a holder of a neutral identity card or neutral travel document uses the number in that document.
Can I get a Georgian tax number without coming to Georgia?
Yes. There are 2 routes that do not need you at the desk: an individual who is not an individual entrepreneur may be registered by applying through a video call or the remote identification service, and registration through a representative is allowed on a power of attorney certified by a notary, which needs no apostille. An individual who has no place of residence in Georgia may apply as well, and the application then carries the address abroad.
What documents does the Revenue Service ask for?
An application on the form of Annex No I-01 and an identity document. Where a representative applies for you, the notarised power of attorney goes in with them. If what you file is incomplete, you are given a deadline to complete it before the application can be refused, and a refusal is reasoned and in writing.
How long does it take to get the number?
Tax registration is carried out no later than 5 working days from the day the application is filed. After it, a taxpayer certificate on the form of Annex No I-03 is issued and your data are entered in the unified register of tax registration. A refusal, where one is given, is notified within the same 5 working days.
Do I need a Georgian tax number to register for VAT?
Yes. An individual without Georgian citizenship is obliged to go on tax registration once a tax obligation arises, and passing the VAT threshold is one of those obligations. Registration becomes mandatory when VAT taxable supplies exceed GEL 100,000 in any 12 consecutive calendar months, the application is due within 2 business days, and VAT is charged from the transaction that takes you over the threshold, that transaction included.
Do I need one to apply for a tax residency certificate?
Yes. Your taxpayer number is one of the details the electronic application to the tax authority asks for, next to your name and address, so it has to be assigned before you apply. The high net worth individual route is the single exception, and it runs the other way round: a person granted residency there who holds no number gets the certificate and a 9-digit number together.
Does having a Georgian tax number make my foreign income taxable in Georgia?
No. Income of a resident individual that is not Georgian-source income is exempt, and a non-resident pays Georgian income tax only on Georgian-source income. What decides it is the source: services actually rendered in Georgia are Georgian-source, and so are services a Georgian resident supplies to a recipient in another state unless they are supplied through a foreign permanent establishment. Work done from Georgia for clients abroad is therefore Georgian-source income, whatever number sits on the return.