Brussels Requires Suppliers of the Public Administration to Issue Electronic Invoices
As of November 1st, 2020, suppliers of the public administration in Brussels are obliged to invoice electronically. With this measure, the government hopes to encourage the implementation of B2G e-invoicing with regional and local public entities in the capital as well as in other parts of Belgium.
The obligation for suppliers to invoice electronically in Brussels, whether they have a legal entity in Belgium or not, is set out in Circular 2020042332: Extension of the use of electronic invoicing by entities in the Brussels-Capital Region.
With this measure, Brussels joins other European Union countries such as France and Italy in extending the obligation to use electronic invoicing not only to public administrations but also to their suppliers. The Europe-wide electronic invoicing obligation was established by European Directive 2014/55.
Entry into Force
The new measure comes into force on September 1, 2020 for all public contracts published on and after that date. It also applies to tenders or bids issued from September 1, 2020 onward.
Beginning November 1st, it applies to public contracts and tenders with a value lower than 30,000 Euros (excluding VAT).
There are two exceptions to the electronic invoicing requirement:
- Public contracts awarded to businesses based in a country in which suppliers have no access to the PEPPOL network.
- Public contracts for which payment is made in advance or on the day of delivery or service.
Electronic Invoicing in Belgium
The Belgian federal government has assumed the obligation to receive and process electronic invoices since January 2017. Beginning one year later, in January 2018, only suppliers with contracts exceeding 135,000 Euros were obliged to issue electronic invoices.
Since January 2020, it has been mandatory for all suppliers of the Belgian federal government to issue electronic invoices. However, not all public entities are enforcing the measure.
Electronic invoices in Belgium are sent to the public administration in accordance with the PEPPOL interoperability model. All governmental bodies are given access to the Mercurius platform for invoice reception.
Although the electronic invoicing requirement for suppliers of the Belgian government at the federal and regional level is not yet fully enforced, the administration is set on implementing the system.
The Brussels government has calculated the cost savings involved in using electronic invoicing. For the issuing company, electronic invoicing represents a savings of 3.24 Euros per invoice compared to the paper format due to administrative simplification. Recipients enjoy a 5.77 Euro cost reduction thanks to dematerialized invoice management. Another benefit is the reduction in environmental costs from the more than one billion paper invoices sent in Belgium each year.
Electronic invoicing also provides an advantage to any company wishing to compete for public contracts in Belgium, both nationally and locally.
EDICOM offers clients an international solution that opens the door to more than 70 public administrations: the EDICOM Global e-Invoicing Platform.
Among other platform features, it guarantees a connection to the PEPPOL network as a certified PEPPOL Access Point. This makes it the perfect solution for operating in the Belgian public market.
*The contents of this publication belong solely to EDICOM GROUP and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Union.
