PEPPOL (Pan-European Public Procurement On-Line) is an open standard that enables the exchange of standardized machine-readable documents over networks, regardless of whether organizations use different IT systems.
This includes e-invoices, but also e-orders, e-advance payments and e-directories.
The solution is based on three different pillars.
- The network (Peppol e-delivery network)
- The document specifications (Peppol business cooperation for specifications)/li>
- The legal framework that defines network control (Peppol transport infrastructure agreement).
Peppol is owned and maintained by the non-profit organization OpenPeppol.
Peppol was originally created to provide public sector organizations in Europe with a standardized way to exchange electronic business documents, but it has over time been adopted by more than 300 organizations that serve as access points to networks in 30 countries in Europe, Asia and North America.
As the technology has spread to more parts of the world, the original acronym PEPPOL has become simply Peppol.
InExchange and Peppol
InExchange has been an approved access point for a while and Peppol is fully supported. InExchange also monitors all updates relating to the format and rules and regulations. Peppol has permission to make amendments to its formats twice a year, amendments which a system supplier may find difficult to find time to implement.
Regardless of the format your ERP system can handle, InExchange will convert between this and the formats required by Peppol free of charge.
Send invoice to Peppol recipient
If you send your invoices via InExchange, you do not need to do anything special. The option to send to recipients of Peppol is included in your service.
Receive invoice from Peppol senderIf you use a service with InExchange to receive invoices, you can contact our support to register the company as a recipient in Peppol’s register. The registration costs you nothing extra.
After that, you can receive invoices from a Peppol sender in the format in which you normally receive your documents from InExchange.
We will convert from Peppol’s format to yours at no extra charge.{4}
If you use InExchange for invoice processing, no special software is required to send or receive via Peppol. We will convert the material so that it is interpreted correctly by the recipient, regardless of the format the sender uses.
Conversion and the Swedish Bookkeeping Act
If your ERP system does not handle Peppol BIS Billing 3.0, InExchange will of course help to convert between your existing format and Peppol BIS Billing 3.0.
The Swedish Bookkeeping Act states that “accounting information that the company has received from anyone else must be stored in the condition the material was in when it was received by the company”; however, under general advice, the following clarification has been provided:
“Accounting information received in electronic format, which is not in a physical format when it reaches the company, may be converted for the company’s system and be saved in the converted format, provided that the data is not changed or does not disappear during conversion.”
When a conversion is performed, InExchange saves all information about what happens with your documents.
You are welcome to read an overview of this.
You therefore do not need to worry about breaking any law by not being able to handle Peppol BIS Billing 3.0.
However, one recommendation is that you note in a description of the accounting system that a conversion by InExchange is taking place, so that your system documentation and processing history comply with the Swedish Bookkeeping Act. It is stated in the Swedish Bookkeeping Act that the company must prepare descriptions of the organization and structure of the accounting system that are needed to provide an overview of the system (system documentation).
