E-Invoicing

The introduction of mandatory e-invoicing (following B2G, this now also applies to B2B transactions) poses extensive new challenges for companies in Germany.

Going forward, invoices must be issued, transmitted and received in a ‘structured electronic format’ and enable ‘electronic processing’. Paper invoices, emails, PDFs or other image files do not meet these requirements. Instead, the EU has agreed on the use of the Extensible Markup Language (XML) format. In addition, business rules for the content and structure of an invoice in XML format have been defined. These requirements must already be met in several European countries, including Germany. In the coming years, mandatory e-invoicing will also be gradually implemented in many other EU countries.

The applicable requirements raise numerous questions, but also offer potential for digital progress within the company:

• To what extent is my business affected by the new e-invoicing requirements?
• Which functional units (e.g. tax, IT, accounting, etc.) may be affected by necessary changes?
• What do these requirements mean for incoming and outgoing invoice processing within my company?
• Which systems are affected and how can they be enabled for e-invoicing?
• How can I ensure that affected systems meet all requirements for incoming and outgoing e-invoice processing?
• How can I implement all VAT regulations in the context of e-invoicing in a compliant manner?
• Do I need to adjust the setup of my internal VAT determination and VAT calculation?

If you are currently asking yourself these or similar questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. We will be happy to assist from a VAT, procedural and technical perspective in order to provide you with comprehensive support on your journey to electronic invoicing. Please find more details about our services on e-invoicing below.

Our Services

E-Invoicing Health Check

Find your way around both the German and the rapidly changing international e-invoicing landscape: with our E-Invoicing Health Check, we help you to bring structure to the jungle of VAT-related, technical and procedural issues.

Our E-Invoicing Health Check is conducted by a VAT expert and a technical expert in the field of e-invoicing over the course of a structured 2-hour workshop.

Content of this workshop

• Structured overview of your status quo and outlook
• Discussion of legal requirements and initial recommendations for action
• Answers to your questions
• Optional: Documentation of the current situation and recommendations for action
• Optional: Compact roadmap as a guide for the next steps

If you are interested, please contact our experts directly or reach out via our contact form.

E-Check test case packages

Take advantage of our ready-to-use test case packages (e.g. Section 14(4) German VAT Act, EN 16931, etc.) to systematically test your validation application and, if necessary, request individual additional test case packages (e.g. other formats, specific constellations, additional national business rules).

Use our negative test cases to prove that your validation application reliably detects all relevant format and business rule errors and create robust documentation showing that you are using a ‘suitable validation application’ – ready for submission as part of a tax/VAT audit.

If you find that the quality of your validation application is insufficient, our experts will be happy to assist you with technical advice and suggestions for suitable optimization.If you are interested, please contact our experts directly or reach out via our contact form.