For an invoice to be recognized as such and to be eligible for input tax deduction, certain requirements must be met.
The German Value-Added Tax Act sets out clear rules: accuracy and completeness must be guaranteed by the invoicing party. The recipient is obliged to check all details. Commercial invoices must be issued within 6 months.
The following information must not be missing on any invoice over EUR 250: Name and address of the company providing the service and the invoice recipient, tax number or VAT identification number, invoice date, invoice number, information on the service provided, actual time of delivery/service, invoice amount – broken down by tax rates. If, in addition, you have agreed in advance on reductions or discounts, these must also be included on the invoice.
Only if all these criteria are met is an invoice entitled to input tax deduction – it is therefore legal. If the invoice does not comply with the legal requirements, this can be very expensive. Even more annoying: once such an invoice has been booked and sorted, the errors only become apparent to the tax officer. Accounting errors also have a negative effect on your cooperation with customers. In the worst case, an incorrect or incomplete invoice will not be recognized by the customer as a business expense. Not a good prerequisite for successful customer retention.
It is therefore important for companies to pay attention to legal guidelines. The more efficiently you design your billing process, the more productive your company will be. Fellow Consulting can help you set up the optimal process for your company. With the right tools, you can not only streamline your business processes, but also make them more efficient. In a survey, our customers stated that the introduction of an automated invoice verification saves about 15% time and 90% errors.
To increase productivity in accounting and operational process management, we can use artificial intelligence in 2020: With Ephesoft Transact, invoice verification becomes easy. Web-APIs support the direct embedding of Ephesoft Transact into company applications and customer portals. Tailor-made scripts transform the logic of your business processes into workflows. Thus, your invoices can be processed and verified fully automatically. Fellow Consulting will be happy to present different possibilities to identify the best tools for you.
How does Ephesoft Transact check invoices for legal requirements?
With Ephesoft Transact you can automatically capture different content from structured and unstructured data and have fixed index fields checked automatically. The validation engine guarantees accurate data. With OCR all contents are searched. Invoices are scanned, contents checked and intelligently sorted. Within this process, you can also verify that invoices are correct and save manual effort, time and money.
Tools for maximum efficiency in the billing process
To perfect your billing process, it’s worth using Infor’s complete digital document management package. IDM Capture – an add-on product developed by Ephesoft and Infor – allows you to automatically link documents to your core business. For example, a supplier’s invoice can be automatically scanned by IDM Capture and synchronized with Infor’s ERP system for payment. This solution takes your entire invoice process to the next level. Not only you do eliminate the need for manual data entry, but you can map your accounting process holistically.
We would be happy to advise you personally on the many possibilities that the tools from Ephesoft and Infor offer and make your life easier – so that you too can soon save 15% of time and reduce 90% of errors!
Fellow Consulting is happy to support you in optimizing your accounting process. In a short meeting we will define the scope of the project and find the right tool for your needs. Only a few weeks will pass before you can get started – depending on the scope of the project, the implementation can also take only a few days.
Why work with Fellow Consulting?
Thanks to years of experience in digital business and the successful implementation of various software systems for customers from all industries, we find tailor-made solutions for every requirement. We make the tools of our partners fit for you, not you for the tools. This way we guarantee optimal results in the fast implementation of the software with Fellow Consulting. You can simply rely on our expertise and experience.