Ask how to prove a payment from a foreign client and you will be given four acronyms and no agreement: FIRC, e-FIRC, FIRA, BIRC. Your CA wants one, your bank says it does not issue it, the payment app sends something with a similar name, and a forum insists you cannot file your LUT without it.
Here is the short version. You do not need any of them to file an LUT, GSTR-1, GSTR-3B or your income-tax return. The law names a FIRC or BRC in one place: a GST refund claim. What every other part of the system cares about is that the money actually arrived, and since 1 October 2026 that is recorded by your bank, not proved by a certificate you hold.
What each document actually is
| Name | What it is | Who gives it |
|---|---|---|
| FIRC | Foreign Inward Remittance Certificate. A bank certificate, discontinued for export payments in June 2016 | The bank that received the money; now only for foreign investment |
| e-FIRC | Not a document. The bank's record of the remittance in RBI's export system (EDPMS) | Your bank, inside EDPMS |
| BIRC | Bank Inward Remittance Certificate. An advice on bank letterhead in the old FIRC format | Your bank, under its own policy |
| FIRA / e-FIRA | Industry vocabulary. No RBI, FEDAI or CBIC text defines it | Payment apps and some banks, for their own records |
| BRC / eBRC | Bank Realisation Certificate, generated from EDPMS data | Your bank |
Two corrections hide in that table. First, an e-FIRC is not “the FIRC for small amounts”: the banks' dealers' association described it as a bank-to-bank record with “no need to issue the same in physical form”. Second, the instruction that ended paper FIRCs came from that association (FEDAI), which tells its member banks how to operate. It is not an RBI rule, which is why branches still answer differently.
You do not need one for the LUT
The LUT is a self-declaration. CBIC's master circular told officers that a “self-declaration to the effect that the conditions of LUT have been fulfilled shall be accepted unless there is specific information otherwise”, and the notification that sets who may file one names no document. On the portal you pick the financial year, name two witnesses and tick the declarations. The only upload offered is a previous LUT.
The myth has a real ancestor. Until 4 October 2017, the LUT was open only to certain exporters, including those who had received at least Rs. 1 crore of foreign remittances the year before. That condition was removed in 2017; the advice built on it was not.
Or for GST returns, or your ITR
GSTR-1 reports exports in Table 6A: invoice number and date, value, whether tax was paid. GSTR-3B reports them in Table 3.1(b). Neither has a field for a FIRC. An income-tax return is filed with no attachments.
What GST does need is the money, not the paper. A service counts as an export only if, among other things, “the payment for such service has been received by the supplier of service in convertible foreign exchange or in Indian rupees wherever permitted by the Reserve Bank of India” (IGST Act s.2(6)). Under an LUT, if it has not arrived within a year of the invoice, or the FEMA period if that is longer, the IGST becomes payable with interest.
GST asks whether the money arrived. Only a refund claim asks you to prove it with a certificate.
Where you do need one: a GST refund
Rule 89(2)(c) of the CGST Rules asks an exporter of services claiming a refund for “the relevant Bank Realisation Certificates or Foreign Inward Remittance Certificates”. CBIC's checklist separates the two refund routes:
- Refund of input tax credit on exports under an LUT: “BRC/FIRC in case of export of services”.
- Refund of IGST you paid on an export: “BRC/FIRC /any other document indicating the receipt of sale proceeds of services”.
The GST portal's own refund FAQ adds that “multiple invoices can be added against single BRC/FIRC”, so one certificate can cover a batch. Whether a bank's BIRC or a payment app's FIRA is accepted as the “FIRC” on the LUT route is not settled in any text we have read. If a refund is the reason you want the document, ask your bank for a BRC first.
When the money arrives as rupees
PayPal, Payoneer, Wise, Upwork and Deel often pay you as an ordinary rupee transfer. Two separate questions follow, and they have different answers.
Who gives you the proof? RBI requires a licensed cross-border payment aggregator to “provide the documents / information required by the exporter” to your bank, so that the bank can close your export entry. So the platform owes your bank paperwork. No text we have read says either the platform or your bank must hand you a FIRC. RBI publishes the list of authorised payment aggregators on its website, and the list changes, so check it for your app rather than trusting a blog (this one included).
Is it still a zero-rated export? The law allows payment “in Indian rupees wherever permitted by the Reserve Bank of India”. The only rupee route CBIC has confirmed meets that condition is payment from a Special Rupee Vostro Account (Circular 202/14/2023). Platform rupee payouts have no official answer either way. Do not let anyone tell you it is settled in either direction.
Since 1 October 2026: the EDF and your bank's record
RBI's new export regulations, in force from 1 October 2026, never mention a FIRC, FIRA, e-FIRC or BIRC. Instead, your bank records every remittance against your exports in EDPMS and marks the entry off “after ensuring that the export value has been realised”. For an invoice of up to Rs. 10 lakh, it can close the entry on your own declaration that you were paid.
The same regulations introduced the Export Declaration Form for services, which is where most of this October's bank questions come from. What the EDF asks, and whether it applies to you.
Where the money wentBefore the paperwork question there is the money question. The free calculator shows what a payment from abroad is worth after each route's fee and currency margin.What to keep for every payment
- The invoice, with its date, currency and the client's country.
- The bank's credit advice, or the BIRC if your bank issues one. Ask once what its published policy says about how to get it and what it costs. From October 2026 every bank must publish the documents, timelines and charges for each export process, and keep the charges “reasonable and proportional”.
- The platform's statement for the payment, if it came through one, showing the gross amount, the fee and the conversion.
- The rupee amount credited, so the gap between what you invoiced and what arrived can be explained later.
Keep them for 72 months from the due date of that year's GST annual return, or seven tax years for income tax if you are in one of the listed professions, whichever is longer. “Six years”, which you will see quoted, is short on both counts.