XRechnung for All German Authorities from 2020
From 2020, all invoices to authorities must follow German CIUS XRechnung
For several years, more and more companies have switched to electronic invoicing. This means that invoices can increasingly be submitted only digitally, for example by email or download. This requires prior agreement on electronic transmission. The advantages of a digital office are clear: significant savings in time and costs.
Current developments in electronic invoicing in Germany
From November 2020, all public authorities in Germany must convert their electronic invoice workflows to XRechnung format. The deadline is November 27, 2020. XRechnung is an XML-based semantic invoice data model.
XRechnung affects all public institutions and authorities. It does not matter whether the contractor is based in Germany or another EU country. All invoices to authorities must be issued in XRechnung format. B2C and purely B2B scenarios are not affected.
Since EU Directive 2014/55/EU, public contracting authorities in Europe are required to receive and process electronic invoices. In this context, the EN 16931 standard was developed to define which elements an e-invoice must contain by default. XRechnung is an XML file that fully complies with these EN 16931 schema requirements.
The supported XML syntaxes are UBL and CII (Universal Business Language and UN/CEFACT Cross Industry Invoice). Only these two syntaxes are permitted for valid XRechnung submission.
This can create practical challenges, for example where SAP Sales and Distribution does not generate these formats directly. In practice, many companies also need a visual representation of the invoice XML data as a PDF. For that, the XML invoice data must be validated and transformed into HTML or PDF. The German public sector provides a corresponding SDK with XSL files here: https://github.com/itplr-kosit/xrechnung-visualization.
XRechnung vs. ZUGFeRD
For electronic invoicing, the so-called ZUGFeRD format is also widely used. ZUGFeRD stands for Central User Guide of the Forum for Electronic Invoicing Germany. ZUGFeRD 2.0 was released in March 2019 after version 1.0 had already been available since 2014.
The Forum for Electronic Invoicing Germany (FeRD) is an initiative of associations, ministries, and companies and has existed since 2010. More on FeRD is available here.
ZUGFeRD is a hybrid e-invoice format: XML invoice data is embedded in a PDF (specifically PDF/A-3). This allows both machine processing and human-readable viewing.
Although the data structure of ZUGFeRD 2.0 is also based on EN 16931, XRechnung is intended to become the central standard for public administration in Germany. The goal is to establish a common, uniform, and binding technical standard that benefits both contractors and public clients.
How is migration to XRechnung implemented?
There are conversion solutions that can transform almost any invoice into XRechnung. This is usually done from ERP systems such as Microsoft, SAP, Oracle, or similar vendors. Such a conversion solution is required when ERP systems do not provide UBL or UN/CEFACT Cross Industry Invoice output. The resulting XRechnung can then be sent by email or De-Mail with an XML attachment, transmitted via EGVP or VPS channels, or submitted through an online form.