Topics

Migration to E-Invoice / Umstellung auf E-Rechnung

You might know: As per EU law, the e-invoice will soon be required for all commercial processes.

It's defined by the EN 16931 compliance which is covered by various data formats.

With PHP and some libraries we can implement the ZUGFeRD / FacturX data format here.

For Germany also specifically "XRechnung" which based on the EN16931 standard but has some additional country-specific requirements.

What information should the eInvoice contain?

  • Invoice Number
  • Issue Date
  • Seller Information
  • Buyer Information
  • Items
  • Total Amount

Process

  • Make sure we have all fields required for such an invoice, including the buyer reference if possible
  • Either use the existing invoice PDFs or create also a new PDF here
  • Create the XML file (the main eInvoice)
  • Link the PDF with the XML for sending also visual representation if needed

Furthermore, this can of course be connected also to an existing outside system or send those to a specific API or alike.

Libraries needed

To implement eInvoicing in a PHP environment, one can use the following libraries: