XRechnung, ZUGFeRD and Peppol – All you wanted to know about the electronic invoice in Germany – What does SAP actually offer (part 4/4)

[francois_vigneron]

Knowing the context of the electronic invoice, and what XRechnung and ZUGFeRD stand for, let us now turn to SAP's offering.

While SAP offered a consulting solution for sending ZUGFeRD invoices already in 2013, Peppol and e-mail delivery are now available as a standard product: SAP Document Compliance, cloud edition (formerly known as SAP Document Compliance, invoicing option for Peppol). SAP users with subsidiaries abroad already know SAP Document Compliance as an "on-premise edition" or under its former name "eDocuments". In combination with SAP Cloud Platform Integration Suite, SAP Document Compliance enables the end-to-end connection of governments or business partners in more than 20 countries.

The reason for a cloud edition is that certain services such as Peppol can only be offered by certified providers. In these cases, SAP has to manage the service and can only offer it as a cloud business application.

Illustration: Implementation options depend on country scenarios and/or on whether SAP can/must act as a provider.

 

The Peppol Exchange service for the cloud edition of SAP Document Compliance includes the usage rights for the required mapping tool (SAP Application Interface Framework, AIF) and for the on-premise connector. Business users benefit from a single user interface across all scenarios. Whether Peppol, email delivery, inbound or outbound invoices or non-Peppol scenarios such as FatturaPA in Italy, SII in Spain, invoice registration in Hungary or payment registration in Mexico, the cockpit looks just the same. This makes SAP Document Compliance a great solution for e.g. smaller billing teams and shared service centers.

The invoicing option for Peppol does not only cover Germany. Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Sweden are already there. Further countries are in preparation or under investigation[1]. For the latest list, check the documentation at Supported Countries/Regions by Product. Cross-border billing between these countries is also foreseen by default.

The Peppol Exchange service also covers incoming invoices and has a standard interface to SAP Invoice Management by OpenText in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. Other countries are planned to follow at the discretion of OpenText. Any other invoice approval addon can use the same addon interface from SAP Document Compliance so that you do not have to disrupt your existing tools, settings and processes to receive Peppol invoices.

What exactly does the solution include for Germany?

• Billing from SAP modules SD, FI, IS-U (Utilities), Convergent Invoicing (CI), and for pilot customers RE-FX (Real Estate):
  
  
  
  • via the Peppol infrastructure in XRechnung (UBL) syntax for billing e.g. local authorities (using the so-called Leitweg-IDs) and business partners (using e.g. VAT-IDs)
  
  
  • via the Peppol infrastructure with the so-called Peppol mandatory profile (BIS BiIlling 3.0) for cross-border billing from Germany to foreign authorities and business partners
  
  
  • via email as PDF including UN/CEFACT XML. The SAP solution follows KoSIT-XRechnung specifications as prescribed for German public entities. As mentioned above (part 3), ZUGFeRD 2.1 meanwhile supports an XRechnung variant (version 2.1 Comfort XRechnung)
  
  
  • and, since December 2020, via email UN/CEFACT XML without PDF container
  
  
  
  


• Invoice reception via the Peppol infrastructure of XRechnung and BIS Billing 3.0 invoices, including a standard interface with SAP Invoice Management by OpenText that can be used with other invoice approval tools.

The latest Transport based Correction Instructions (TCI) for green-field installations of SAP Document Compliance includes all Peppol country notes and Germany processes until December 2020. This simplifies the initial implementations for greenfield customers (see note 2968068 for details).

Illustration: End-to-end Peppol process and the roles of self-service Peppol apps

 

The product documentation can be found at help.sap.com:

• Peppol Service Guide


• Installing and Configuring the SAP Cloud Platform Cloud Connector


• SAP S / 4HANA customizing for eDocuments or SAP ECC eDocument for Germany

The SAP Cloud Platform Missions for Peppol provides project teams with a project board including documentation links and blogs in context of the tasks. It is recommended to follow or look at it before starting a first Peppol or XRechnung project. It helps with questions such as how to connect the service, how to test, or how to select our own Peppol ID.

While a lot of information is available, it can accelerate projects to work with SAP Consulting or one of the many SAP Partners that have already implemented SAP Document Compliance. to complement your internal resources, they can support initial and delta implementations with different options from mere hand-holding to turn-key fixed-scope projects.

You can obtain sales information on "SAP Document Compliance, cloud edition" from your usual SAP contact person (Account Executive or SAP Reseller).

Let's conclude and close the loop with part one of this blog series. Today, horses and carriages are mostly used for sport and hobby. When it comes to electronic invoicing, let us also move with our time .

 

The series is drawn from the German blog XRechnung, ZUGFeRD und Peppol – Alles, was Sie über die elektronische Rechnung wissen wollen (und vi....

For details on the German Peppol ID, see the blog LeitwegID – All you wanted to know about the identification of public organizations for electronic i.... For more information on SAP Document Compliance, see the related Community page.

See also our technical blogs on Peppol, XRechnung, and LeitwegID.

[1] This is current state of planning and may be changed by SAP at any time without notice and for any reason.

[mariodemez]

Dear Francois,

thanks you very much for this article it really helped to get a better overview about the use of the edoc_cockpit also on a global point of view.

Could you please confirm that in order to use the standard SAP solution in several countries (PEPPOL and non-PEPPOL) the SAP Document Compliance (cloud edition) would cover all the liceceses and there would not be additional licenses per country or for example for the on-premise solution (e.g. Italy).

Thanks and kind regards,
Mario

[francois_vigneron]

Hello Mario,

Thank you for the question. With the exception of Brazil where we have specific products, scenarios covered by SAP Document Compliance are

• either offered as a end-to-end country scenario under SAP Document Compliance, on-premise edition + SAP Cloud Platform Integration (e.g. Italy, Spain, Greece, Hungary, India, Chile, Colombia, etc.)


• or as a scenario of SAP Document Compliance, cloud edition (currently Peppol countries such as Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Poland and Singapore).

the decision depends whether SAP can offer the scenario under the on-premise model or has to certify as a provider and offer under the cloud model.

For more information, you can look at the Community page and check the slides of our quarterly customer calls in the SAP Document Compliance Jam group (request access with s-user e-mail at gsjam [at] sap.com). The later contains a country roadmap.

Kind regards, Francois

[Bernard_Sohier]

Hi Francois,

 

What is in the pipeline for France?

Will Peppol also come available or is SAP looking for another e-Invoice solution.

Would ZugFerd be a possibility in S/4HANA cloud or will SAP never offer this?

 

Kind Regards

Bernard Sohier

[francois_vigneron]

Hi Bernard, thank you for the questions.

• For France, we are waiting for the technical specifications of a B2B mandate (2023-2025). Like many others, I cannot imagine that SAP will not support a B2B mandate in France with SAP Document Compliance – whether Peppol or not. But, let’s wait until we have more clarity from the government.
• ZUGFeRD for SAP S/4HANA Cloud is in analysis (ECC and S/4 on premise are already supported, see e-mail delivery note 2855724). So far we had no request on S/4HANA Cloud. All major German platforms are supporting or are expected to support Peppol which is also the recommended channel for both KoSIT and the SAP German-speaking User Group (DSAG) -and you can add SAP to that.

So, both topics to be continued. We will give updates on France and other countries in the Document Compliance quarterlies for S/4 and ECC (follow us in the DC Jam groups) and, on SAP S/4HANA Cloud, with the release communication.

Kind regards, Francois

PS: Note that, for questions, it's better to use the "Ask a Question" link than to comment. You can tag me in the question if you want to be sure I'm the one replying :). 

[former_member683963]

Hello Francois,

I can see settings for Peppol for country Germany (attached screenshot) in our S4/Hana version. Do we have to connect 'Access Point Service' provider to send B2G e-Invoice in Germany or SAP can connect to Peppol and send e-Invoice after completing customization/config?

Thank you,

Niraj

[francois_vigneron]

Hi Niraj, sorry for the late reply. I’m not sure I got your question. But yes the SAP Access Point service is needed for the transmission of UBL XRechnung in Germany. This is provided by SAP Document Compliance, cloud edition. You can find more details in the “Concepts” of the product documentation at https://help.sap.com/viewer/18b7404616704ee5a71ca373418fc4bf/Cloud/en-US/5071295ce2f94a9eb4efad33cd2...

PS: Please consider opening question using the the top right “Ask a question” link.

[former_member683963]

Thank you so much Francois,

[altaz]

Hi François,

for Germany in a S/4HANA Public Cloud solution : Does the e-invoicing solution only works for B2G e-invoicing or also for B2B ones?

Thank you in advance,

Regards

Laure

[ulla_ringler]

Hello Laure,

Thanks for your question, it is not exclusively for B2G scenarios and can also be used for B2B transactions, provided that the receiver accepts it.

E-invoices of SAP Document and Reporting compliance are following the EU CEN Standard EN 16931. In the context of Peppol, UBL is used, and in the area ZUGFeRD, Cross Industry Invoice is used.