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Lebanon TIN number guide

TIN​

The tax administration issues a unified Tax Identification Number (TIN) encompassing all tax categories, including customs and real estate fees. This TIN is not exclusive to tax return filers but extends to those with tax liabilities, such as property tax below a specific threshold.

The Tax Administration assigns a TIN to:

  • Individuals conducting business individually, as partnership participants, shareholders in a company, owning real estate in Lebanon, or subject to inheritance or other taxes.
  • Professions, establishments, partnerships, corporations, companies, or joint ventures.
  • Employees engaged in work on Lebanese soil, regardless of their employer's residency status.
  • Governmental entities, municipalities, associations, or any entity with tax obligations.

It's important to note that the TIN for an individual differs from the TIN assigned to their profession, establishment, partnership, corporation, or company.

For individuals the TINs are given based on numerical serial without the use of any letters. The TIN for entities registered in VAT are followed by a dash and a code (601 for the taxpayers subject to VAT, 603 and 604 for refund purposes...)

Frequently Asked Questions​

A foreign company registered in Lebanon's Commercial Register missed the two-month MOF deadline. What is the fine, and how is the TIN obtained?​

Any foreign company branch registered with the Commercial Registrar must apply for commencement of activity at the Ministry of Finance within two months of that registration date or face a fine of LBP 2,000,000. [1] The MOF application goes to the Revenue Directorate (Income Tax Department) and must include the Commercial Register extract, articles of association translated into Arabic, and the appointed branch manager's documents. A separate registration at the National Social Security Fund and the Ministry of Labour is required within one month of incorporation. [1] Upon successful registration, the MOF issues a TIN (numeric serial for individuals; entity TIN with suffix -601 if VAT-registered at the LL 5 billion threshold). The LBP 2,000,000 penalty does not waive the obligation — the branch must still register and will additionally owe any back-taxes accrued from the missed period.

Lebanon's VAT rate is being raised from 11% to 12%. When does it take effect and which invoices must use the new rate?​

In February 2026, the Lebanese Cabinet approved a 1-percentage-point VAT increase — from 11% to 12% — to fund public-sector salary increases, triggering nationwide protests. [2] Finance Minister Yassine Jaber confirmed that while the petrol price hike was immediate, the VAT increase requires formal parliamentary legislation before it can be collected. [2] VAT-registered businesses (identified by the -601 TIN suffix) must monitor the Official Gazette for the enacting law before changing their invoice rate. Applying 12% before parliamentary passage creates over-collection liability; remaining at 11% after the law's gazette publication creates under-collection liability. Businesses should prepare accounting and point-of-sale systems now but not switch rates until the law is published. Credit notes will be required for invoices issued at the wrong rate during any transitional overlap.

Lebanon's parliament passed a banking secrecy law in 2025. Does this mean my Lebanese bank account details can now be shared with foreign tax authorities?​

Yes, for foreign tax residents. Lebanon's Law No. 1 of April 2025 fundamentally ended the 1956 banking secrecy framework, granting the Banking Control Commission and Central Bank access to all account data with retroactive effect for the preceding ten years (back to 2015). [3] Lebanon has been a participant in the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS) since Law No. 55/2016; Lebanese financial institutions are required to identify clients who are tax residents in CRS-partner countries and report those accounts automatically to the partner jurisdictions. [4] The practical consequence: a foreign national with a Lebanese TIN who holds a bank account in Lebanon and is tax-resident abroad may now have their account balance and interest income reported to their home tax authority. Lebanese TIN holders should obtain and provide their home-country TIN to their Lebanese bank to ensure CRS self-certification forms are correctly completed and to avoid being misclassified.

Lebanon's 2026 budget introduces a 3% customs advance on non-compliant importers. Who is caught and how is it applied?​

Article 31 of Lebanon's 2026 draft budget bill instructs the Customs Directorate to collect an advance payment of 3% of the declared customs value on every import operation carried out by a taxpayer who has not filed income tax and VAT declarations for any of the three years preceding the import year. [5] The measure is designed to catch shell importers that clear goods on behalf of third parties and then dissolve without paying taxes. Lebanese employers' associations publicly opposed the provision, warning it creates a cash-flow burden on businesses in arrears due to the economic crisis rather than deliberate evasion. [5] The 3% advance is credited against the taxpayer's final income tax liability — it is not an additional tax but a pre-collection mechanism. The only way to avoid it at the border is to ensure all income tax and VAT declaration filings (G1, G2, G3, G5 forms) are up to date in the MOF system before importing.

Lebanon has been extending income tax filing deadlines repeatedly — are there penalties if a declaration is filed after the statutory deadline but within an extension period?​

The Ministry of Finance issued multiple deadline extensions throughout 2025: MoF Decisions 734/1 and 735/1 (August 2025) pushed FY 2023 and FY 2024 annual income tax filings to 31 October 2025; Decisions 897/1, 898/1, and 899/1 (October 2025) further extended those deadlines to 30 November and 30 December 2025 depending on entity type. [6] Filing within an officially published extension period carries no late-filing penalty — the extension legally resets the deadline. However, any tax balance due is still subject to interest under Article 74 of the Tax Procedure Code if it was not paid by the original statutory deadline, regardless of the filing extension. [6] Businesses that missed even the extended deadlines are exposed to both the penalty and interest, and as of 2026 also risk triggering the 3% customs advance on future imports. Always verify the current applicable deadline on the MOF portal (finance.gov.lb) before filing, as extensions are announced irregularly.

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