Is electronic invoicing mandatory?
Knowing the deadlines for your business
Aix en Provence, April 13, 2022 | Dhanges have been made
According to a study by ZION Market Research, the global e-Invoicing market will represent $20 billion by 2026. France, like other European countries, is also moving towards mandatory electronic invoicing. The European states have a clear objective: to fight against VAT fraud. This fraud weighs about 134 billion € within the member states of Europe and about 8 billion € in France (the Court of Auditors estimates it at about 15 billion €!).
With this new reform, all French companies will be required to :
- to issue, transmit and receive invoices in electronic form in their VAT transactions - domestic B2B,
- to transmit to the tax authorities additional data (e-reporting) concerning B2C and international B2B transactions, as well as payment data.
What are the deadlines following the postponement of the reform?
- Obligation to receive dematerialised invoices:
This concerns all VAT-registered companies in France: by 2026.
- Obligation to issue dematerialised invoices :
- September 1, 2026: for large companies not classified in the previous categories.
- September 1, 2026: all mid-sized companies with fewer than 5,000 employees and sales of less than €1.5 billion.
- September 1, 2027: all micro-businesses with fewer than 10 employees and sales of less than €2m; and all SMEs with fewer than 250 employees and sales of less than €50m.
What are the benefits?
Why dematerialise invoices? Let's see how to turn a constraint into a business advantage. We are all aware of the shortfalls in the execution of manual processes caused by the use of paper documents. Dematerialisation will streamline the end-to-end process with a number of efficiency-based benefits:
- speed up invoice processing, i.e. reduce payment times and thus better manage cash flow,
- reduce the costs associated with paper-based invoice processing, both at the level of issue (printing, enveloping, stamping, postal delivery) and at the level of the payment process (reminders, litigation),
- benefit from immediate access to invoices, inducing the centralisation of invoices via a one-stop shop.
What are the risks for your company?
The mandatory transition to electronic invoicing implies a change for all companies in the organization of their purchasing, sales, treasury and accounting processes. Of course, these changes are weighted according to company size and sector of activity. However, rethinking purchasing and sales processes is currently the major challenge facing finance departments, as the first deadline is 2026. While companies are certainly managing all or part of the future mandatory data required by the reform, they are not prepared to structure it and send it to the target system. This is where the challenge lies: adapting processes and information systems to the new requirements. Although some of the procedures for implementing e-invoicing are not yet definitive, the role of the IT department in relation to the finance department is very important in auditing the existing system, supporting the transition and carrying out all the actions required to analyze and measure the impact.
The risk for the company is however measured, because the finance law puts forward two objectives favourable to the company. The first concerns payment deadlines, which will be accelerated. The second is to make it easier to file a VAT return, the invoice being its main vehicle.
eas'Invoice is the electronic invoicing solution that can meet your needs in your customer and supplier invoice scenarios.