Glossary

The Armenian tax authority. Runs the cash-register registry, the marking system oversight, and the src.am portal. When something is "registered with SRC", it has formal fiscal-receipt authority.

The two Tax Code articles that govern cash registers. Article 380 covers hardware fiscal registers; Article 380.1 covers electronic (virtual) ones. Canonical text on the ARLIS legal database.

Armenia's national certification authority for digital signatures. Issues the identity certificates that cash registers and merchants use to sign receipts before sending them to SRC. Most fiscalization workflows start with an EKENG certificate.

A pair of artifacts in the EKENG-issued identity flow used by cash registers. A CSR is generated locally and submitted to EKENG; EKENG returns a CRT that the cash register uses to sign receipts before sending them to SRC. Mostly developer-facing; you'll meet these terms when integrating a virtual cash register.

Tax Identification Number. An eight-digit identifier issued by SRC to every business and individual entrepreneur. Required for cash-register registration and printed on every fiscal receipt.

A physical fiscal cash register — the box at a checkout that prints paper receipts and sends each sale to SRC almost in real time. Every cash register sold in Armenia must be approved by SRC. SRC keeps two open lists on its HDM page: approved models, and authorised servicers. Both PDFs, both Armenian only.

English-language usage. «ՀԴՄ» (Hskich-dramarkghain mekena) is the Armenian acronym. In English-language usage on the Armenian market several labels turn up — and they're far from equally common:

• HDM — direct transliteration of the Armenian acronym. Despite being a calque, this is what actually dominates: Armenia's national services gateway writes «Cash Register (known in Armenia as HDM)»; SRC's own filenames use it (uc_hhpek_hdm_*); integrator libraries on GitHub and Packagist follow; the WooCommerce fiscal-receipt plugin is called «TAX SERVICE Electronic HDM».
• Cash register / electronic cash register — descriptive English, no acronym. SRC's own English news prose uses these (e.g. "Electronic cash registers system introduced in Armenia" — six "electronic cash register" mentions, no acronym anywhere). Most journalism and legal sources do the same.
• ECR — generic English abbreviation for "electronic cash register". The full phrase exists across the Armenian market; the abbreviation effectively does not. We checked SRC's own English news, the Armenian Tax Code's English version, IMF/World Bank/OECD reports on Armenia tax — no Armenia-context source we found compresses the term to "ECR" in prose.
• CRM — appears in SRC's menu metadata (title_en field for the /144 entry) but never in actual prose, and conflicts with Customer Relationship Management. Doesn't dominate anywhere.

fiscal.am uses cash register in descriptive prose and HDM when referring to the SRC's HDM page or filename conventions.

A software-only cash register. Legally identical to a physical one (Tax Code Article 380.1), but runs on a service provider's servers and exposes an HTTP API. Used by online stores, marketplaces, and PoS apps. See the providers catalog.

Naming. The legal Armenian term is «էլեկտրոնային ՀԴՄ» (per Article 380.1). English-language usage on the Armenian market is split between two vendor brands — neither is industry-neutral, and the more visible one carries an English-script collision:

• VCR — used by vcr.am as their brand (223 brand mentions on their English landing page, plus 42 of the descriptive virtual cash register). Caveat: «VCR» in standard English first reads as Video Cassette Recorder, a tape-deck — anyone outside the Armenian fiscal-tech bubble will parse it that way before the cash-register meaning. fiscal.am does not push the acronym in prose for that reason.
• EHDM — used by ehdm.am / PayX+ LLC as theirs (18 mentions on their main page). No collision, but vendor-specific.

Neither acronym appears in the law itself. fiscal.am uses the descriptive virtual cash register in prose and names the vendor brands when the context calls for it.

The economic union to which Armenia belongs. Most relevant to fiscalization indirectly: the EAEU framework drives the rollout of mandatory product marking categories. Armenia's marking system is aligned with EAEU schedules.

Armenia's national operator for product marking — the system that applies unique DataMatrix codes to regulated goods (medicines, beverages, dairy, and others) on a rolling category-by-category schedule set by Government decrees within the EAEU framework. At checkout, marked codes are "retired" through e-Mark Receipt apps that talk to both e-Mark and SRC. See the marking system for how it interacts with the receipt.

A 2D barcode standard. The marking code printed on regulated goods is encoded as a DataMatrix; at checkout, the cash register scans it to retire the code through the e-Mark system. Older 1D laser scanners can't read it — businesses selling marked goods need 2D-capable scanners.

A receipt that has been registered with SRC and carries a verifiable QR code plus a unique fiscal number. Issuing a non-fiscal receipt where a fiscal one is required is a finable offence under Tax Code Article 416. See Anatomy of a fiscal receipt.

The unique identifier returned by SRC after a receipt is registered in its ledger. It's printed on the fiscal receipt and encoded inside the QR code. A receipt without a fiscal number is, legally, not a fiscal receipt.

The SRC registration form for putting a cash register (hardware or virtual) on the books for a specific business location. Typically filed through the SRC taxpayer portal at file-online.taxservice.am. SRC periodically changes form codes and field sets — confirm the current template with your accountant or directly in the portal before filing.