Is your company ready for e-invoicing?
March 2024 - Digital invoicing between companies will be mandatory from Jan. 1, 2026. Still a long way off, you think? Yet you'd better not wait too long.
Mandatory digital invoicing is the brainchild of Finance Minister Vincent van Peteghem (CD&V). But Belgium is anything but a pioneer: countries such as Italy, France and Poland have embraced electronic invoicing before.
What is an electronic invoice?
Electronic invoicing is done through an encrypted electronic invoice. Thus, an e-invoice is not a PDF invoice, but a file that can be read by computer software. The great advantage of this is that e-invoices can be entered directly into the accounting system, without requiring another manual task.
Benefits of e-invoicing
In addition, electronic invoicing offers several other advantages.
· Electronic invoices significantly reduce the risk of errors.
· Moreover, they are also faster, more efficient and cheaper than their paper counterpart.
· Studies show that the e-invoice can reduce the administrative burden for businesses and citizens by 3.36 billion euros.
Are Belgian companies ready for the e-invoice?
About 15 per cent of invoices between companies are already sent electronically. According to Unizo, about 25 per cent of companies are ready for digital invoicing today. 25 percent are not ready and the other half do not know.
What do you need to invoice electronically?
There are a lot of tools and online applications for electronic invoicing. Some platforms are even free. Often electronic invoicing is part of a complete administration and process management package, but stand-alone tools are also available. It just depends on exactly what you want to do.
Fiscal support measures
The Belgian government just approved a tax benefit package. There will be an increased investment deduction of 20 percent for digital investments, including software for e-invoicing as well as a temporary increased cost deduction of 120 percent for the cost of renting billing packages and for consulting costs.
