Federal Ministry of Finance Clarifies B2B E-Invoicing Validation and Mandatory Invoice Elements for 2025

• The Federal Ministry of Finance released a new letter clarifying and expanding requirements for B2B e-invoicing in Germany, effective from 1 January 2025.
• The letter emphasizes the need for technical validation of e-invoices, in addition to checking for completeness and accuracy of obligatory invoice elements.
• Three error categories are defined: format errors (syntax), business rule errors (semantic/logical), and content errors (incorrect or missing mandatory elements).
• Companies must validate both incoming and outgoing e-invoices and retain validation reports as evidence to avoid risks such as loss of input VAT deduction or invoice rejection.
• Validation solutions must address all error types and comply with the duty of care of a prudent businessman to ensure legal protection.

Source: kmlz.de

Note that this post was (partially) written with the help of AI. It is always useful to review the original source material, and where needed to obtain (local) advice from a specialist.

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