eInvoicing

The Starting Point

The aim of EU Directive 2014/55 / EU of April 2014 is to promote digitization in the public sector, thereby simplifying and accelerating processes. Estimates assume possible cost savings of 60 to 80%.

According to EU Directive 2014/55 / EU of April 2014 it is mandatory for all contracting authorities to receive and process electronic invoices.

Federal Republic of Germany issued a federal e-bill law passed in April 2017 translating these EU requirements into national law. For all public institutions of the German federal states and local authorities, a deadline of April 2020 is in place. Federal authorities already have meet the deadline November 2018.

This means that billers must issue and submit invoices in electronic form. Bill recipients must receive these electronic invoices electronically using an administration portal.
The German federal government and some federal states are in the process of developing an invoice receipt platform with which incoming invoices can be simply transmitted to the relevant authorities in the administration.

Invoice Formats

  • What is X-Rechnung?

    An e-bill within the meaning of the EU Directive 2014/55 / EU must meet certain structure and content requirements.

    X-Rechnung is a German internal administrative standard. It has defined a uniform internal invoice term and given it the name X-Rechnung.

    The X-Rechnung is a structured, standardized record in XML format that can be sent and processed electronically. The XLM format is only machine-readable.
     Other digital formats such as emails, plain PDFs, or scanned invoices do not meet the requirements because they lack standardization and structure.

  • What is ZUGFeRD 2.0?

    ZUGfeRD is a hybrid format. It consists of the mandatory machine-readable part, which contains all information according to the EU Directive and an additional image or PDF file that can be read by persons.

    However, it is still unclear whether all federal states accept the hybrid format.

  • What is PEPPOL?

    PEPPOL (Pan-European Public Procurement OnLine) is an international solution aimed at standardizing cross-border, publicly funded public procurement (public eProcurement) within the European Union.

    It is an open European data exchange network that any person and institution can join. The aim of PEPPOL is to connect a wide range of procurement processes and electronic billing systems in Europe via a web service-based infrastructure. This meets the requirements of secure and reliable data transmission.

Country-Specific Versions

The country-specific requirements and their implementation may differ between EU Member States, but they typically use Universal Business Language (UBL) in different versions with customizations, as well as PEPPOL specifications and access points for verification and transport. The main advantage of UBL is that business documents can be standardized for different purposes. UBL is a flexible, international standard that supports many business needs, so these business documents can be exchanged across borders.

Zugferd 2.0 Profile EN 16931 is a fully compliant CIUS of the CEN standard.
XRechnung is a compliant CIUS of the CEN standard.

The Process

Our Service

You send us your invoices as XML or create them via our cloud solution. We take care of the mapping and the validation and forward your invoice to the invoice recipient. We support all 3 formats (X-bill, ZUGFeRD, PEPPOL BIS).

We support and advise you on the implementation of e-invoicing.

Experience the e-invoicing advantages:

  • compliant with legal regulations
  • cost reductions for document editing
  • reduction of faulty invoices and fast execution of payments

Additional Archiving

All e-invoices have to be electronically archived. GoBD (Grundsätze zur ordnungsmäßigen Führung und Aufbewahrung von Büchern, Aufzeichnungen und Unterlagen in elektronischer Form sowie zum Datenzugriff) has to be applied. The XML-file of the X-Rechnung is regarded as the original invoice.