The 2023 edition of Electronic Invoicing Day redefined the contours of the reform and clarified many outstanding points, both technically and operationally, as well as the next stages of the calendar.
Just over a year from the deadline, the timetable for the generalization of electronic billing between professionals is accelerating. While on July 1, 2024, the approximately 4 million businesses subject to VAT in France will have to be able to receive and accept dematerialized invoices from their suppliers, the Electronic Invoice Day, organized in mid-March in Paris by the FNFE-MPE (National Forum for Electronic Invoicing and Electronic Public Procurement), provided clarification on many points. However, the first responders began by reminding the 900 people who had come to fill the auditorium of the Palais Brongniart of the framework and purpose of the reform.
This generalization, which will also oblige suppliers to transmit their invoices in electronic format as well as the associated data, according to a staggered schedule between mid-2024 and 2026, has four main objectives: to facilitate VAT declarations (pre-filling), to improve the real-time knowledge of business activity, fight against tax evasion, increase business competitiveness (security of transactions, reduction of administrative burden). On the last point, the gains will be "substantial", thanks to a reduction in processing costs and a shortening of payment times, explained Emmanuelle Levieils, project manager at the project management within the general direction of public finances. (DGFiP) of the Ministry of Economy, Finance and Recovery. "For companies, electronic invoicing will not only reduce costs and delays by automating operations, but also reduce disruption, whether in terms of disputes or shortages", added Cyrille Sautereau, president of the FNFE-MPE.
The participants also took advantage of this day of exchanges and information to obtain clarifications on various points. First on the concept of electronic invoice within the framework of the new system, in the light of the transmission channels that will be authorized and the formats retained. Regarding the transmission and reception channels, the options mentioned in article 289 of the General Tax Code remain possible, always provided that the authenticity of the origin, the integrity of the content and the legibility of the invoice are insured from its issue until the end of its retention period. “But the “simple” electronic invoice will no longer suffice, insisted Cyrille Sautereau. It will have to contain not only the data necessary for its automated processing, but also data for the administration, with a readable representation for the controllers”.
Above all, transactions will have to be carried out via a new device, based on a so-called “Y” model, which will prevent the failure of one of the links from blocking the entire chain. This system requires companies to use the services of a dematerialization platform: either one – or even several – partner dematerialization platform (PDP) of their choice, registered by the administration, or directly the public billing portal (PPF), in this case Chorus Pro. The latter, already known and widely used by hundreds of thousands of companies for their public customers, will fulfill three functions: manage a directory, concentrate the data intended for the administration, and offer a minimum service of exchange. This, according to three access modes : Portal (entry/submission of the invoice, uploading to the platform), API (or "Service" mode) and EDI. And in one of the three permitted structured formats, namely CII, UBL And Invoice-X, a mixed format combining in the same file an invoice readable in PDF format and invoice data presented in structured form. “Eventually, the public portal will therefore no longer accept PDF invoices, even if a tolerance is planned until December 31, 2027,” said Emmanuelle Levieils.
Apart from Chorus Pro, only partner dematerialization platforms will be authorized to send invoices directly to recipients, in addition to extracting the data and transmitting them to the PPF while checking their quality, and managing the statuses (submitted, rejected, cashed) of the invoice life cycle. Their registration will be done via a dedicated portal, which is scheduled to open next May-June. The instruction of each application will be ensured by a specific service with national competence installed in Lille, with delivery of a registration number within two months from the submission of a complete file, valid for a period of three years. “At the start, the registration number will take effect on the date of entry into force of the reform, on July 1, 2024, even if the issue of registration to the operator is earlier”, specified Emmanuelle Levieils. Attention, warned Cyrille Sautereau, "to date, there is no PDP registered, but only candidates to become one, in connection with the offers of the solution publishers (global management and ERP software packages, purchasing management , sales, logistics, payments, etc.) and alternative service providers”.
As part of the exchange system developed by the DGFiP, Dematerialization Operators (OD) operating unregistered private platforms will indeed be able to offer their services, but with the obligation to send invoices via a registered dematerialization platform or Chorus Pro . With its innovations in this field, and in particular its Invoice 4.0 offer, Acxias is thus positioned as an OD by using the Chorus APIs to retrieve electronic invoices on the client side and automatically integrate them into SAP Ariba related to the command lines. Only, “in this ecosystem that is not necessarily easy to understand, how do you find your way around and choose the right channels? questioned Cyrille Sautereau, providing the beginning of an answer: "It depends first of all on the number of invoices and the organization of the company, but also on its capacity for integration and compliance, or even monitoring and implementation of regulatory obligations. It is also a question of budget and available resources”.
Due to the multiplicity of actors, a lot of information was also communicated about their interoperability during the day at the old Stock Exchange. To guarantee this interoperability at all levels (format, addressing, monitoring, guarantee of conformity, etc.) within the framework of the Y-shaped exchange system of the French administration, but also at European Union level, a “proof of concept” is currently being studied based on the DCTCE model, for “Decentralized CTC Exchange”. While waiting for this more technical aspect of the reform to be clarified, a pilot phase scheduled for the first half of 2024 will test all the functionalities of electronic invoicing and transmission of transaction data, to adapt the system and identify best practices. Its aim is also to communicate on the reform, raise awareness and reassure. Application files to participate in this pilot will be available to "volunteers" (companies, service providers, platform operators, software publishers, etc.) from April, for notification of successful applicants before the summer and preparation for start-up in the last quarter of 2023.