Belgium - 2018 eInvoicing Country Sheet

Legislation

The federal law modifying the VAT code of 17.12.2012 puts eInvoicing on an equal footing with paper invoicing, legalising the use of eInvoices as of 1 January 2013. This law links the use of eInvoices with the willingness of the receivers to process it. This law does not mandate the use of eInvoices in B2G procurement.

The regional government of Flanders decided in 2016 to make the use of eInvoices in B2G procurement mandatory as of 1 January 2017 for all its regional entities.

The federal government decided to mandate use of B2G eInvoicing since 1 January 2018 for all federal entities, for contracts above €135k.

The main entity of the Government of the Brussels Region now accepts eInvoices, but does not make it mandatory yet.

The other regional governments in Belgium will follow and soon enable the receiving and processing of eInvoices.

The transposition of the Directive 2014/55/EU is in process.

eInvoicing platform and management solutions

In Belgium, electronic invoices to the public sector can easily be submitted through the Mercurius platform. This platform that receives all invoices destined for all Belgian public authorities (central, regional and local), and makes them available to the receiving party. The federal government is charged with the setup, operations and maintenance of Mercurius. This platform has a web interface that allows any sender to check the status of their invoices. This web interface is also accessible to intermediates/service providers and customer representatives, so that all parties share the same “track and trace” information.

The Mercurius Platform is a B2G eInvoicing solution based on the ePRIOR platform, which was developed and used by the European Commission. At the end of its pilot phase, Belgium decided to integrate Mercurius with the PEPPOL interoperability framework, official as of 1 April 2016, going one step further towards interoperability with the private sector. 

Approach for receiving and processing

Mercurius centralises the reception of eInvoices to the public sector, so Economic operators are sure to be able to send all their eInvoices to any public institution using the same method. The processing of eInvoices, however, is not harmonised. Each public contracting authority is free to apply the processing that best fits its own context. On the other hand, contracting authorities recognise the value of streamlining their processing. A best practices exchange and reflection group is established for this purpose.

Economic operators can submit an electronic invoice in two ways:

1. By applying the PEPPOL interoperability framework;
2. For the ones not yet able to apply the PEPPOL framework: by using the invoice manual submission form available on the Mercurius platform (only for Belgian operators).

As the PEPPOL interoperabilty framework gains more and more traction within the IT sector, soon more and more affordable eInvoicing solutions will arise. More information on the rollout of the PEPPOL framework in Belgium, including a list of active PEPPOL Access Point service providers, is available on the official page of the Belgian PEPPOL Authority.

Status on the implementation of the European Standard on eInvoicing (EN)

The Belgian government instances expect that the infrastructure developed between 2015 and 2017, will greatly facilitate the adoption of the EN. They intend to take advantage of the PEPPOL interoperability framework to implement the eInvoicing Directive, in order to offer practical solutions to economic operators, and to promote their reuse for B2B eInvoicing. The EN will take over the role of common denominator format. Intersectorial eInvoicing will be much easier thanks to this key asset. Indeed, B2G eInvoicing has many specificities in common with intersectorial eInvoicing.

The Mercurius platform will also facilitate the implementation of the Directive, offering tools and support to the private and the public sector to cooperate more effectively.

A rollout within the government instances is in preparation. Additionally, a global communication strategy is being designed. It will include an update of www.efacture.belgium.be.

Additional information

Experience gained with the inbound eInvoicing scenario, has lead many of the customers to extend their ambitions to other inbound and outbound flows, such as e-ordering, outbound invoicing, among others. This creates new opportunities to exploit the infrastructure that has been put in place in the past. An e-ordering pilot phase is in execution. The Flemish Government has the lead on this pilot. A new pilot, focusing on outbound invoicing, is also in preparation, in collaboration with the Government of the Brussels Region.

VALIDATED BY THE EMSFEI MEMBER

Last updated:  Dec 20, 2019 17:04