The Federal Ministry of Finance (MoF) has recently shared additional information on electronic invoicing which is among the proposed tax measures included in the Growth Opportunities Act.
In July 2023, The MoF published its proposal to amend VAT law to introduce mandatory e-invoicing for domestic B2B transactions. The federal government approved this proposal in August 2023. According to the proposal, e-invoices must conform to the eInvoicing standard of the European Committee for Standardization (CEN), EN 16931.
The MoF provided additional clarification in a letter published in October 2023. If the Ministry’s proposal, as clarified in this letter, is adopted as law, the following will be applicable:
- Invoices that follow both the well-established XStandard and ZUGFeRD formats from version 2.0.1 onwards comply with the EN-based format requirements.
- Efforts are ongoing to ensure the continued use of EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) procedures within the future legal framework, although certain technical adjustments will be required.
- It is important to highlight that the government draft outlines a phased transition, however, all taxpayers will be obliged to be able to receive electronic invoices as of January 1, 2025.
For more details on e-invoicing plans in Germany, you can visit our blog.
