European e-invoicing: the common rule, the national deadlines

What is the same everywhere

Since 2017, EN 16931 has defined the semantic model of the European electronic invoice: the information an invoice must carry, named BT-xx, grouped into BG-xx blocks, and the consistency rules it must satisfy, numbered BR-xx.

The standard also fixes the two permitted XML syntaxes: UBL 2.1 and UN/CEFACT CII. Everything else — hybrid PDFs, Peppol BIS Billing 3.0, XRechnung, Factur-X, ZUGFeRD — is a profile or a wrapper built on top of those two.

This is why a single reader works across the continent: an invoice issued in Italy, Germany or Spain uses the same fields and obeys the same rules as one issued in France.

What differs from one country to the next

• The schedule. Each member state sets its own dates for receiving and for issuing, and often staggers them by company size.
• The national rules. On top of EN 16931, countries add their own checks — BR-DE-* in Germany, BR-FR-* in France, BR-IT-* in Italy.
• The identifiers. SIREN and SIRET in France, USt-IdNr. in Germany, NIF in Spain, Partita IVA in Italy: each has its own structure and its own check digits.
• The channel. Some countries route invoices through a central platform, others through an accredited network such as Peppol.

Two national schedules are described here in detail: France, where receiving becomes mandatory on 1 September 2026, and Germany, where receiving has been mandatory since 1 January 2025.

Receiving and issuing are two different obligations

Wherever you are, keep these two apart — confusing them is the most common mistake.

Being able to receive an electronic invoice usually comes first, and usually applies to everyone at once, regardless of size. Being obliged to issue one comes later, and is generally phased in by company size.

The practical consequence is the same everywhere: for a period, structured files land in your inbox while nothing in the business is yet organised to read them. That gap is exactly what this tool is for.

What to do, in order

1. Find out how invoices reach you. Central platform, accredited provider, Peppol access point, plain email: you cannot check what you never received.
2. Check your company data. Legal name, address, VAT identification number, national company identifier. One wrong field and an invoice may never arrive.
3. Tell your suppliers and customers which channel you now use. It saves the classic period where everyone sends to the wrong place.
4. Be able to read a file you received, well before you are asked to issue one.
5. Keep the original files. A printout or a screenshot is only a representation of the invoice, not the invoice.

What Lekteo does, and what it does not

Lekteo opens the files you receive and checks them against EN 16931. It lays the invoice out in plain language, flags inconsistencies using the real amounts, and lets you export the data as JSON or CSV. Everything happens in your browser.

It does not issue invoices, does not transmit them, replaces no platform, and gives no tax or accounting advice. This page describes a standard and a landscape; for your own situation, your accountant remains the right person to ask.