FIRC and inward remittance: what proves payment arrived
A buyer pays, the bank issues a certificate, and the file feels closed. It is not, because the certificate answers a narrower question than most exporters think it does. This guide separates what a FIRC evidences from what the bank reports, what a refund claim asks for, and what actually settles the export.
A Foreign Inward Remittance Certificate is a bank's confirmation that foreign currency reached an account: who sent it, how much, on what date, and under which purpose code. It is a useful document and it is frequently the wrong one to reach for. The Reserve Bank's FED Master Direction No. 16/2015-16 on Export of Goods and Services touches it once in an operative sense, at paragraph C.2, which requires authorised dealer banks to report the electronic FIRC to EDPMS wherever such FIRCs are issued against inward remittances. That single sentence places it: the FIRC is an artefact a bank issues and then reports, not the record the regulator keeps.
What does a FIRC actually certify?
It certifies a credit. Remitter, amount, currency, value date, and the purpose code the transaction carried. DGFT's public eBRC frequently asked questions define that last field plainly: the purpose code is assigned to a transaction and states the purpose for which the transaction is being made. Everything a FIRC asserts is about the money.
What it does not assert is equally important. It does not say goods left India, it does not say which shipping bill the credit belongs to, and it does not say the invoice has been paid in full. Those are separate assertions made in separate systems by separate parties, and the gap between them is where most export files go quiet. We could not find a Reserve Bank prescribed format for a FIRC on any official host, and the Master Direction does not define the term. Treat the layout of the certificate your bank issues as its own commercial practice rather than as a regulatory form.
Why is the certificate not the regulatory record?
Because the record sits upstream of it. Paragraph C.2 of FED Master Direction No. 16/2015-16 provides that EDPMS captures the details of advance remittances received for exports, and that authorised dealer banks report all inward remittances, including advances and old outstanding inward remittances received for export of goods or software, to EDPMS. The electronic FIRC is reported into the same system wherever it is issued. So the certificate is downstream of the report, and an exporter holding a stack of certificates has proof of credits, not proof of closure.
That is why a bank can hold an export entry open while you are looking at a certificate for the very payment it is chasing. Why your shipping bill is still showing as open works through the five pairings that break, and none of them is fixed by producing another copy of the certificate.
Where is a FIRC still the document that is asked for?
In the GST refund file, and there it is named directly. Paragraph 48 of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs Circular No. 125/44/2019-GST dated 18-11-2019 records that in rule 89(2) of the CGST Rules a statement containing the number and date of invoices and the relevant Bank Realisation Certificates or Foreign Inward Remittance Certificates is required in the case of export of services, whereas in the case of export of goods a statement of shipping bills or bills of export and the relevant export invoices is what is required.
Annexure A to the same circular carries it into the checklist. For a refund of unutilised input tax credit it lists the BRC or FIRC in case of export of services, and the shipping bill only for exports made through non-EDI ports in the case of goods. For a refund of tax paid on export of services made with payment of tax it lists the BRC or FIRC or any other document indicating the receipt of sale proceeds of services. The two GST refund routes covers which of those two files you will be building.
Why are goods and services not judged the same way?
Because for one of them the money is the export. Paragraph 48 of Circular No. 125/44/2019-GST clarifies that realisation of consideration in convertible foreign exchange, or in Indian rupees wherever permitted by the Reserve Bank of India, is one of the conditions for export of services, and that in the case of export of goods realisation of consideration is not a pre-condition. The circular goes on to say that insistence on proof of realisation of export proceeds is therefore misplaced for goods refunds.
Read that as a document rule and it explains the asymmetry every finance team notices. A goods exporter proves the export with a shipping bill and treats the remittance as the closing entry. A service exporter has no shipping bill, so the remittance is not the closing entry, it is the export itself. The foreign exchange obligation to realise and repatriate applies to both, and it runs on its own clock: the realisation clock changes on 01-10-2026.
What does the bank report before you see anything?
An Inward Remittance Message. DGFT's public eBRC frequently asked questions define the IRM number as a reference number assigned by the bank to an inward remittance transaction, used to identify it and link it to the exporter's account. The same document records that reporting the IRM to DGFT does not require the submission of any documents to the bank, and that the bank has to report all foreign remittances on an account credit basis.
Two consequences follow, and both surprise people. The first is that banks are obligated to report all foreign remittance IRMs to DGFT on an account credited basis, and where an inward payment arrives by RTGS or NEFT in Indian rupees the beneficiary bank reports the IRM on the exporter's declaration basis. The second is that an exporter cannot generate an eBRC without an IRM, which the same FAQ states in terms. The certificate in your drawer has no bearing on either. The electronic bank realisation certificate, end to end covers what the exporter does with the message once it appears.
The credits that prove nothing on their own
Four shapes account for most of the remittances that arrive and still leave a file open.
- An advance received before shipment. DGFT's eBRC FAQ records that an eBRC can be generated for purpose code P0103 for standalone cases, so an advance is not stranded, but it is not evidence of an export that has not happened yet.
- A round figure covering several invoices. The credit is real and the allocation is missing, which is the single most common reason an export entry stays open at the bank.
- A payment split across two banks. The same FAQ states that where inward part payments are received at two banks against a single shipping bill, the exporter generates a separate eBRC against each payment. One certificate will never cover the shipment.
- A credit net of deductions. Where the buyer or an intermediary bank has taken charges, the FAQ points the exporter at self-generating the eBRC on the amount received in the IRM and entering the deductions in the shipping bill and invoice details, rather than treating the shortfall as unexplained.
What should be kept against each credit?
The test is simple: for any credit in the account, can you say in one line which export it paid, for how much, and why the amount differs from the invoice if it does. That is the answer a bank, a refund officer and an auditor all want, and it is the answer a certificate on its own cannot give.
- The credit advice with its purpose code. The code is the bank's assertion about what the payment was for, and DGFT's FAQ records that a change to it is requested from the bank, not made by the exporter.
- The link to the shipment or the invoice. One credit to one or more shipping bills or service invoices, written down at the time rather than reconstructed a year later.
- The difference and its reason. Bank charges, an agreed discount, a quality claim. Named at the point it arises.
- The eBRC generated from that message. For a scheme claim, this is the artefact that is read, and it is generated from the IRM rather than from the certificate.
- The certificate itself, for the services refund file. Circular No. 125/44/2019-GST asks for the BRC or FIRC in the export of services cases, so keep it where the refund file can find it.
Where to go from here
An inward remittance is read by three different readers for three different purposes, and each of them has a guide.
- The bank's reading. Why your shipping bill is still showing as open covers what closes an export entry, and why a payment in the account does not.
- The certificate that a scheme claim reads. The electronic bank realisation certificate, end to end sets out the self-certified route and what it depends on.
- The service export case. SOFTEX and service exports covers the exporter who has no shipping bill at all.
- The window the credit is measured against. The realisation clock changes on 01-10-2026.
- Generating and tracking the certificates. eBRC is a sibling service that works on electronic bank realisation certificates against the remittances banks report.
Purser holds the shipment, the invoice and the credit as one record, so the line that says which payment settled which export is written when the money arrives rather than reconstructed at audit. Purser never submits to a government portal, and it never sends an outbound message without a recorded human approval event, so the note to your bank is yours to approve and yours to send. Purser Outbound keeps the record.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between a FIRC and an eBRC?
They are different documents in different systems. DGFT's public eBRC frequently asked questions state that e-FIRC and eBRC are different systems. A FIRC is a bank's certificate that foreign currency was credited to an account, while an eBRC is generated by the exporter on the DGFT platform from an Inward Remittance Message the bank has reported, and the same FAQ records that an exporter cannot generate an eBRC without an IRM.
Is a FIRC required for a GST refund on exports?
For export of services, yes. Paragraph 48 of CBIC Circular No. 125/44/2019-GST dated 18-11-2019 records that rule 89(2) of the CGST Rules requires a statement containing the number and date of invoices and the relevant Bank Realisation Certificates or Foreign Inward Remittance Certificates in the case of export of services. For export of goods the circular asks instead for a statement of shipping bills or bills of export with the relevant export invoices.
Does a FIRC close an export entry at the bank?
No. Paragraph C.2 of the Reserve Bank's FED Master Direction No. 16/2015-16 on Export of Goods and Services requires authorised dealer banks to report the electronic FIRC to EDPMS wherever such FIRCs are issued, which makes the certificate an input to the system rather than the closure of an entry. An entry closes when the remittance is matched to the shipping bill in the terms the bank recognises.
Is realisation of payment required before a GST refund on export of goods?
No. Paragraph 48 of CBIC Circular No. 125/44/2019-GST dated 18-11-2019 clarifies that realisation of consideration in convertible foreign exchange, or in Indian rupees wherever permitted by the Reserve Bank of India, is one of the conditions for export of services, but that in the case of export of goods realisation of consideration is not a pre-condition for the refund claim.
What happens when one export is paid into two different banks?
Each payment is treated separately. DGFT's public eBRC frequently asked questions state that where inward part payments are received at two banks against a single shipping bill, the exporter generates a separate eBRC against each payment. The exporter therefore ends up with two certificates covering one shipment, and the allocation between them has to be recorded rather than assumed.