Wednesday 20th August, 2014

E-billing will be mandatory for the French public sector and all providers of public services by 2020. Although, the changeover to the new system is due to happen slightly earlier, gradually starting from 2017.

France is the latest country to follow the European trend towards a paperless administration, along with Italy, Spain and Portugal.

According to the schedule set out by the French Administration large companies and public sector suppliers will be the first to roll out e-invoicing, by 1 January 2017. For the remaining suppliers and service providers, the deadlines will be as follows:

• January 1, 2018: medium-sized businesses

• January 1, 2019: SMEs

• January 1, 2020: microbusinesses (10 or fewer people).

Once migration is complete, it is estimated that some 95 million electronic invoices will be processed. For businesses, electronic invoicing will also be a source of savings that could reach €335 million per year.