POS Ticket Retention: What the AEAT Says

In the daily operation of a restaurant, simplified tickets are largely misunderstood. They are issued by the thousands, accumulate in boxes or TPV rolls, and after a few weeks end up in the trash because "they take up too much space". Sometimes the owner assumes they are less important than formal invoices and therefore do not require retention.

The AEAT doesn't agree. Tickets are tax documentation and have their own retention rules. And in an inspection, their absence can lead to serious problems.

What is a Simplified Ticket

The simplified ticket (or "simplified invoice") is the document a business issues to final customers for low-value operations. In hospitality, it's what comes out of the TPV every time a bill is paid. It serves as proof of sale for the customer and as a record of the operation for your business.

The important thing: even though it's called "simplified", it is an invoice. It has tax validity. It generates output IVA that you must declare. And the AEAT can demand its exhibition.

How Long to Keep Them

Simplified tickets, like any issued invoice, must be retained for the IVA statute of limitations period: four years from the end of the corresponding voluntary declaration period.

In practice, this means that a ticket issued in March 2026, whose IVA is declared in Q1 2026 (due in April 2026), must be kept until April 2030 at a minimum. Four years from the end of the voluntary period.

Applying prudent criteria (interruptions of the statute of limitations, possibility of inspection), many restaurants round up to "keep for 6 years" to avoid calculating each time.

What to Do with the Stack of TPV Rolls

Here's the operational problem: an average restaurant till issues 80-300 tickets/day. In 4 years, you accumulate tens of thousands of tickets. Retaining them on paper is not viable in the medium term.

The good news: the AEAT accepts digital retention, provided that:

Content integrity. The ticket data cannot be altered after its issuance.
Legibility. If the Tax Agency requests them, they must be readable just like the original.
Traceability. It must be possible to demonstrate that the digital file corresponds to the original ticket.

In practice, this is met in several ways depending on your TPV system:

1. Your TPV system already saves tickets digitally. Almost all modern TPV systems internally store every ticket issued in their database. As long as that database is operational and not deleted, the tickets are retained. Confirm with your TPV provider that the digital file is maintained for the legal period.

2. Your TPV system exports to an external system. Some systems daily export Z reports (summary) and individual tickets to an accounting or backup system. In that case, tickets reside in two places: the TPV and the external system. More secure.

3. Your TPV system only issues paper. Older systems that only print and do not save internally. In this case, you either change your TPV system (recommended for Veri*factu reasons as well), or you digitize the rolls yourself (impractical for high volume).

Daily Z Reports: The Accounting Summary

More important than individual tickets are the daily Z reports (also called cash closures, end-of-day totals, or Z reports). The Z report is the summary at the end of the day that reconciles:

Total sales for the day.
Sales by IVA type.
Payments by method.
Cancellations and discounts.

Your accountant uses the Z reports to settle the quarterly IVA. The AEAT can request Z reports in any inspection. Retention of Z reports is mandatory without question. Period: the general one, minimum 4-6 years.

If for some reason the Z reports for a period are deleted or not retained, the only way to reconstruct them is with individual tickets. That's why both are important: Z reports for operational accounting, tickets as the ultimate backup.

Common Ticket Errors

1. Not retaining anything because "it's just a ticket". This is the riskiest attitude. Tickets represent collected IVA, and your declared taxable base relies on them. Without tickets, proving declared sales becomes complicated.

2. Throwing away the TPV roll at the end of the day. If your TPV system does not internally save tickets, throwing away the roll is destroying tax documentation. Before discarding it, ensure you have a digital copy or that your TPV system stores them.

3. Migrating to a new TPV system without migrating data. When you change TPV systems, the old data can become inaccessible if not exported correctly. Before uninstalling the old one, export everything issued and save the file in an accessible format (CSV, Excel, PDF).

4. Relying solely on the TPV system without backup. The TPV system is a computer. If the hard drive breaks, tickets can be lost. A policy of periodic backup (weekly or monthly) to an external system is good practice.

5. Having disorganized Z reports. If daily Z reports are not archived by date and are not easy to retrieve, an inspection requesting "the Z reports for Q2 2024" becomes an operational problem. Digital archive ordered by year/month/day.

How to Digitize Correctly

If your TPV system does not internally save tickets and you need to digitize them:

1. Periodic scanning of the roll. At the end of the day (or week), scan the entire roll to PDF. Name it tickets-2026-04-15.pdf. Archive it in a year/month structure.

2. Retention of printed Z reports. Paper daily Z reports are also digitized along with the tickets.

3. Cloud backup. Not just on a local disk. A copy on Google Drive, Dropbox, or a similar system. Better in two different places.

4. Automated retention policy. Mark in your system when each file can be destroyed (4 years + margin). But do not destroy until you confirm with your advisor that there is no extraordinary reason to keep them longer (open procedures, inspections, pending tax credits).

The Ticket That Becomes an Invoice

There's a particular case in hospitality: the customer asks you for an "invoice" instead of a ticket. If your transaction volume is low (typically under 400€), you could limit it to a simplified invoice. But if the customer requests a full invoice with their tax details, you must issue it.

In such cases, the full invoice is retained with the same rules as any issued invoice (4-6 years). If the ticket was canceled and replaced by an invoice, the canceled ticket is also retained (with a cancellation mark) for traceability.

Conclusion

TPV tickets are not disposable slips of paper: they are tax documentation with retention periods. Four years minimum, six recommended. Digital retention is legal and operationally the only viable option beyond a certain volume.

Most importantly: confirm with your TPV provider how tickets are stored internally, and have a backup system. If an inspection ever comes, having Z reports and tickets archived in an orderly fashion is the difference between a routine visit and a serious scare.

For invoices you receive from suppliers (which is where Sincrio operates), automated digitization with OCR solves legal retention and also provides daily operational utility. Try it free.

This article is for general informational purposes regarding the retention of tickets and tax documentation in Spain as of the publication date. Specific deadlines and obligations depend on the tax regime, location, and current regulations at any given time. It does not constitute tax advice. For your specific case, consult your tax advisor before implementing any document retention or destruction policy.