EU VAT check / VIES

Version v5.11.68

Environment: Docker

Checklist

  • Can you replicate the issue on our v5 demo site https://demo.invoiceninja.com or Invoice Ninja? Yes
  • Have you searched existing issues? Yes
  • Have you inspected the logs in storage/logs/laravel.log for any errors? Yes, for “VIES” and “vat” but I suspect I don’t know what to look for. The only log files regarding that are essentially empty.

Describe the bug

VAT check function should verify EU VAT number using VIES and then toggle the “valid VAT” switch.
I’m not actually sure when this function should run, but I created test users yesterday with valid VAT and their checkbox is still not checked. I also couldn’t find any way to run that check manually.

Steps To Reproduce

add a client with valid VAT number, wait a bit, check again → switch still disabled despite valid VAT

Expected Behavior

add a client with valid VAT number, wait a bit, check again → switch enabled if valid VAT

Additional context

I also checked if php-soap extension is enabled with php -i, but I’m not sure how to check if it is actually installed. it seems all the soap-packages on the debian repository are non-compatible with the docker container invoiceninja/debian

Logs

The only logs I found that contained “VAT” or “VIES”

[2025-04-17 15:30:08] production.INFO: Broadcasting [App\Events\Invoice\InvoiceWasPaid] on channels [private-company-BWqr72KSiJsy66co9kvHog9TiYFJOUoR] with payload:
“private_notes”: “”,
“tax_name1”: “VAT”,
“private_notes”: “”,
“vat_number”: “”,
“has_valid_vat_number”: false,

Hi,

I suggest asking in a discussion on GitHub.