Accounting in Europe is going digital. From 27 November 2020, public administrations and federal agencies will accept invoices over 1,000 only in digital XRechnungs-Format or alternatively in ZUGFeRD 2.1.1 format (PDF file with integrated XRechnung-XML file). A standard PDF file or even a printed invoice is no longer sufficient here.
Surveys have shown that many companies have not yet made the switch to sending a digital Xinvoice. The reason: if solutions for the creation of X-invoices are offered via the ERP provider, they are often expensive, cumbersome and time-consuming to implement. Also, companies usually do not have to convert all invoices, but only those that are sent to a federal authority. Canon offers solutions for creating, validating, sending, receiving and archiving X-invoices that are fast, effective and affordable.
Solutions for any size of business
Canon's XInvoicing solutions are scalable, so they can be tailored for small and medium sized businesses as well as large enterprises.
Canon's small XInvoice solution is an out-of-the-box solution that can be quickly adapted to customer requirements. Advantage: With this variant, the customer has the additional option of managing all documents and information in his company, archiving them securely, creating his own workflows and much more.
The large Canon XInvoice solution is designed as a middleware solution and offers interfaces to one or more ERP and database systems. Outgoing invoice information from the customer's ERP system is transferred, validated, missing information is added to create an Xinvoice and fields are converted according to the Xinvoice specifications. The validated invoice is then automatically forwarded by e-mail or directly to the corresponding federal portal. The same can also be implemented with incoming invoices in XInvoice format.
XRechnung - just a trend?
Companies with customers from the public sector have to change their workflow accordingly in a timely manner in order to continue to guarantee a problem-free invoicing process. "As the new standard brings many advantages, the changeover will also become increasingly interesting for all other companies in the B2B sector and will become established sooner or later". forecasts Patrick Bischoff, Marketing Director Document Solutions at Canon Germany. "This applies not only to Germany, but to the entire European economic area," Bischoff continues.
Compared to paper, documents in digital form can be processed, sent or archived more efficiently and securely. But invoices received as PDF files are often still printed, checked, digitised again and then archived. In the public administration, this workload is now to be minimised in the course of progressive digitisation and a uniform system for invoice processing is to be established.
The XRechnung - the new digital invoice format
The new XRechnung is a structured, machine-readable data record in XML format, in which all data is clearly indexed. All essential invoice components such as invoice number, address or tax rate can thus be read out directly, identified beyond doubt and processed throughout Europe. Two years after the EU Commission decided to switch to electronic invoicing, this regulation is now coming into force at federal level and will initially be bindingly implemented in public administrations and authorities. The changeover to XInvoice will then gradually be introduced in the federal states as well.
Convert securely to XInvoice with Canon
Since all invoice components are indexed and automatically readable in the new digital format, invoice processing is greatly accelerated. The verifiability of the data is also made easier, sources of error can be detected more quickly and archiving is simplified. In addition, cash flow is improved, as all payment data can be directly transferred and processed.
