Up until now, you have probably always sent your invoices as a PDF to your customer. However, it’s also possible that a company or government service with which you exchange invoices now suddenly asks for an electronic invoice (an 'e-invoice' or an invoice in XML or UBL format). But what exactly does this mean? And is this possible via Teamleader Focus?
Disclaimer: for specific information about E-invoicing in Italy, please consult the following article.
What is PEPPOL?
Main purpose
There’s a great deal of information to be found online about E-invoicing and PEPPOL, so we’ll quickly summarize its original purpose here:
Starting in the 90s, companies doing business and electronically exchanging invoices with one another, often suffered from a lot of heterogeneity between providers and industries. This caused the process of exchanging information (such as invoices) to be very time-consuming and inefficient. PEPPOL was a solution to that problem, proposed by a European association in 2008. Its main goal was to make electronic connections with partners (f.e. E-invoicing) faster & simpler by providing universal formats for a wide range of documents.
PEPPOL provides both the formal requirements that different documents (such as invoices) should meet, as well as the network over which they should be exchanged. The formal requirements are described in each UBL version, the network consists of access points that are officially certified by the PEPPOL organisation.
Country-specific implementation
PEPPOL was a European initiative, but its country-specific implementation varied greatly depending on the laws imposed by each country.
In some countries (f.e. Italy), the government has imposed using the PEPPOL network to exchange invoices both in a B2G (Business-to-Government) and a B2B (Business-to-Business) context. That implies that every invoice that’s sent to a supplier, should be sent via the PEPPOL network.
In the other European countries, using the PEPPOL network is currently only required in a B2G context. In those countries, you only have to use the PEPPOL network when sending an invoice to a government/public organisation (although laws are being drafted in order to impose this in a B2B context as well).
How can I send invoices via the PEPPOL network?
Teamleader Focus
As described earlier, the PEPPOL network consists of about 300 certified access points throughout Europe. Both the sender and receiver of the invoice are connected to their own access point (this structure is called the “4-corner-model”).
Teamleader Focus is currently not connected to such an access point, making it impossible to send an invoice directly from Teamleader Focus to the end customer. Luckily, we have multiple partners who connect with our platform and who in turn are connected to an access point. By syncing your invoices to the partner’s tool, they will be converted to the required UBL format and sent to the end customer via a certified access point.
Country-specific information
When a government organisation requires invoices to be sent to them via PEPPOL, they are also using a platform that is connected to an access point. The names of these platforms are different per country, as well as the integrations (partners) we recommend for each country:
| Country | Government platform | Recommended partner/integration |
|---|---|---|
| Belgium | Mercurius | Ixordocs Billit |
| The Netherlands | Digipoort | Billit |
| France | Chorus Pro | Billit |
| Spain | FACe | Billit |
| Germany | E-Rechnung | Billit |
| Luxembourg | CTIE | Billit |
If you send invoices to the government frequently, we advise to install the Billit integration. If you have any questions about the integration (or need help during installation), you can contact Billit directly. This can be done via:
- 03/283.09.09
- support@billit.be
Ixordocs
If you only send invoices to the government occasionally (e.g. a few times a year) we advise you to use IxorDocs, as you'll only pay a fee per invoice and not a fixed fee per month. You can find more information about how it works here.
If you have any questions about this tool, you can contact IxorDocs directly. This can be done via:
Note: In Teamleader Focus accounts with at least one Belgian entity, invoices can also be downloaded (separately) as a UBL/XML file (after activating this via Settings > Invoices > Preferences > Enable ubl download for invoices). This file cannot be used to send on the PEPPOL platform (it doesn’t conform to the latest UBL version yet), it’s rather used by (private) end customers who upload your invoices as purchase invoices in their own bookkeeping tool.