By January 1, 2013, the new European VAT Directive regarding the rules on invoicing which enforces equal treatment between paper and electronic invoices, will come into force in all Member States. By this time, all Austrian federal services will be able to receive eInvoices and from January 1st, 2014, all Austrian suppliers (and foreign suppliers that have the technical means) of the Austrian Federal Government are obliged to use eInvoices according to the Austrian ICT consolidation law (IKTKonG). The use of the PEPPOL (Pan-European Public Procurement Online) Transport Infrastructure for sending eInvoices, based on PEPPOL specifications is an accepted method of eInvoicing in Austria.

PEPPOL invoices can be transmitted to the Austrian Federal Government by foreign and domestic suppliers using the PEPPOL Transport Infrastructure. In either case, the eInvoice is directly submitted to the accounting system of the Austrian Federal Government which triggers the same handling process. Therefore, PEPPOL eInvoices in Austria are already an integral part of eInvoicing developments. 

 Since January 2012, 42virtual Business Services GmbH has been billing services, on a monthly basis, to the Austrian Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF) as part of the PEPPOL project. By the end of 2011, the first eInvoices were sent by 42virtual using the PEPPOL Transport Infrastructure and a structured UBL eInvoice, withexchange, audit and approval of the invoices now carried out electronically. Wolfgang Schneider, CEO of 42virtual, emphasised that only small changes were required to adapt the internal ERP system to implement PEPPOL. “It’s our aim to further expand the use of eInvoices and, therefore, of PEPPOL eInvoices, in the Austrian Federal Government to make the PEPPOL project a success in Austria”, says Schneider.