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Legislation

The provision of the "IKT Konsolidierungsgesetz §5" mandates that all contracting partners of the federal government, including foreign contracting partners, must only submit structured electronic invoices for the provision of goods and services to government departments[1].

The national Transposition of Directive 2014/55/EU is contained in BVergG 2018 §368. In Austria, there has been a minimal transposition of the Directive and the obligation was applied only for contracting authorities above the EU thresholds. The final deadline for the central procuring authorities to comply is the same as the EU date for the implementation of the eInvoicing Directive, was 18th April 2020.

eInvoicing platform and management solutions

e-Rechnung.gv.at is a data transfer method for the delivery of structured electronic invoices (eInvoices) to the Austrian Public Sector as well to other invoice recipients. eInvoices can be electronically transmitted via the Unternehmensservice Portal (Business Service Portal - USP) or via the Peppol eDelivery Network, whereby the process of the invoice handling is optimised for the biller as well as for the invoice recipient.

The Unternehmensservice Portal uses (Business Service Portal - USP) uses ebInterface and Peppol-UBL as the standard format for eInvoices. Since January 2022, the platform supports only the XLM invoicing format ebInterface versions 4.3, 5 and 6. If the eInvoices are submitted via the Peppol eDelivery Network, they must be issued instead in a UBL format. Peppol is mostly use to send eInvoices outside of Austria since a foreign invoicing party usually does not have an Austrian VAT ID and therefore cannot transmit invoices via ebInterface.

The federal authorities no longer accept paper invoices or invoices that are sent by email or in PDF format. The only exception here is the cash payment system. The legal basis for this change is provided by the 2012 ICT Consolidation Act (IKTKonG). The Business Service Portal (USP), which is operated by the Federal Computing Centre (BRZ), is the central processing platform for eInvoicing to the federal government. In order to produce electronic invoices, a one-time registration at the USP is necessary (source).

Solution providers in Austria can choose their preferred eInvoicing platform for submitting eInvoices. However, any used solution (except for solutions using the Peppol eDelivery Network) must connect to the Unternehmensservice Portal (Business Service Portal (- USP) that provides authentication services necessary for the submission of eInvoices and to the the E-Rechnung.gv.at, which is a data transfer method for the submission of eInvoices specifically to the Austrian Public Sector. The federal government’s eInvoicing service, E-rechnung.gv.at, which has been operating since 2012, is able to understand UBL and CII syntaxes. The latest versions of the national standard (i.e., ebInterface version 5.0 and 6.1) take into account the EN and the convertibility to both syntaxes.

Additionally, the Federal Economic chamber maintains a list of service operators, connected to USP, through which the automatic electronic transmission of invoices to federal agencies can be performed.

The BBG (Bundesbeschaffung Ges.m.b.H) is the federal public procurement agency. Economic operators which are commissioned over contracts provided by the BBG have to send invoices to the BBG eInvoices portal. BBG has the legal obligation to evaluate statistical data from the invoices. The BBG invoices portal is connected to the Business Service Portal (USP), the federal government eInvoicing service.

Delivery of eInvoices to this service (E-Rechnung.gv.at) is free of charge for the user.

Approach for receiving and processing

The Austrian federal government receives and processes eInvoices from economic operators supported by the following solutions:

• the Federal Government receives eInvoices created by means of a direct eInvoice upload, manual eInvoice creation via web-form or a web-service connection;
• the Unternehmensservice Portal (Business Service Portal - USP) provides authentication services necessary for the submission of eInvoices and does not require further use of electronic signatures.

Thus, companies submit eInvoices via E-Rechnung.gv.at after authenticating in theUnternehmensservice Portal(Business Service Portal - USP) or as paper, e-mail, PDF, via a solution provider managing the transmission. Solution providers already connected to the Unternehmensservice Portal (Business Service Portal - USP) can forward their clients’ invoices without the need for individual registration.

After the submission, the eInvoices are stored as automatically generated PDFs. This is followed by an automatic pre-acquisition of the invoice receipt document, linking to the archive, which then initiates the processing workflow. The eInvoice processing is integrated into the federal budgeting and bookkeeping system process. Once received by public administrations, eInvoices are processed at federal level through automated and integrated systems linked to the workflow and core systems of the public administrations.

While the processing of eInvoices is automated and integrated into the federal government, it widely differs for all other public entities. For example, in cases when organisations do not have Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems in place, eInvoices are processed manually.

No electronic signature is required for eInvoices and the archiving period amounts to 7 years. Archiving abroad is possible if the eInvoices are accessible online[2].

eInvoicing implementation in sub-central level contracting authorities 

At sub-central level, the eInvoicing system is based on Peppol, used by more than 50 000 contracting authorities. The reception of eInvoices on a sub-central level is not organised by law. They are free to join eRechnung.gv.at, the federal government solution, as receivers voluntarily or implement their solution.

The communication is mainly done through the Austrian eInvoicing standard ebInterface. On this ebInterface, the Chamber of Economy provides a word plugin for the creation of eInvoices. There is also a dedicated eInvoicing portal.

The main identified benefits of the implementation of eInvoicing at the sub-central level are cost and operational savings, the reduction of administrative burden, the optimisation of time to payments and the contribution to process automation. 

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

The latest amendment of the act on public procurement (BVergG 2018) transposed Directive 2014/55/EU. This act came into force in 2018.

The Austrian government implemented a specific plan at the federal level for the implementation of the European standard on eInvoicing. The mandatory Portal Unternehmensservice Portal (Business Service Portal - USP) was extended to allow Austrian public entities to receive eInvoices according to EN-16931. All EN documents can be obtained from Austrian Standards.

The necessary technical requirements of the European standard on eInvoicingare covered in the existing portal e-Rechnung.gv.at.

Monitoring eInvoicing implementation 

The monitoring is implemented only at the central level. 

Use of Core Invoicing Usage Specifications (CIUS) at national level 

Austria has two CIUSes in place: one for the national level (complying with Austrian VAT law) and another one for the government sector’s specific obligations (based on the previous CIUS on VAT law). These two CIUSes are approved by the Federal Minister of Finance.

Additional information

The Bundesbeschaffung Ges.m.b.H (BBG) and the Austrian Federal Computing Centre (BRZ) work together in different EU initiatives (CEN/e-SENS/Peppol).

For Austria, the main challenge will be to overcome the PDF/document-based eInvoice system currently in use in the public sector, therefore no further political steps will be taken beyond the scope of the Directive.

Digital reporting requirements

In Austria, eInvoicing is not currently used for Valuad Added Tax (VAT) digital reporting. However, while no reporting obligations have been introduced, accounting and tax data in SAF-T format can be requested from certain companies by tax authorities in the case of audits. These on-demand requests linked to audits are not considered as Digital Reporting Requirements (DRRs)[3].

[1] Government departments include all federal ministries and their subordinate departments, as well as the Parliament, the Office of the Federal President, the Administrative Court, the Constitutional Court, the Austrian Ombudsman Board and the Austrian Court of Audit, [2] (Electronic Invoice in Austria, 2023), [3] (VAT in the Digital Age Report Digital Reporting Requirements, 2022).

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