E-invoicing in Light

What is this page about: What e-invoicing is, which networks Light supports, and how to register an entity on one. Each network has its own article for the details specific to it. This page covers everything they have in common.

# On this page

• What is e-invoicing?
• Three kinds of network
• Supported networks
• Adding a network to an entity
• What the verification step asks for
• Registration statuses
• Invoice statuses
• What you need before you start
• EAS codes and e-invoice addresses
• Setting up EDIFACT codes on tax codes
• Entities with more than one network
• Receiving e-invoices
• FAQ and troubleshooting
• Related articles

# What is e-invoicing?

E-invoicing means sending invoices as structured data instead of a PDF or a piece of paper. The receiving system reads the data directly, so nothing has to be retyped, and the transaction leaves an audit trail that both parties and, in many countries, the tax authority can rely on.

Most of Europe now requires it in some form. Which form depends on the country, and that is the most useful thing to understand before you set anything up.

# Three kinds of network

The networks Light supports do three different jobs. Knowing which one you are on explains most of what follows: whether you get an address, who receives the document, and what "registered" actually means.

Delivery networks carry the invoice to your customer. You get an address on the network, your customer has one too, and the document travels between them. Peppol and Nemhandel work this way.

Clearance networks send the invoice to the tax authority first. The authority validates it, then delivers it to your customer. You are registered as a sender, and your customer is identified by a code the authority uses for routing. Italy's SDI and the French PA network work this way.

Reporting networks do not deliver anything. The invoice reaches your customer the way it always did, usually as a PDF, and a record of it goes to the tax authority in parallel. There is no recipient address because there is no recipient on the network. Greece's myDATA, Spain's VeriFactu and Portuguese Tax Reporting work this way.

This is why some networks give your entity an e-invoice address and others never will. It is not a missing feature. A reporting network has nothing to address.

# Supported networks

Norway, Sweden, Germany and the rest of the Peppol countries are covered by the Peppol row. There is no separate network to choose for them. See the EHF article for how that works in practice. Finland is the exception among the Nordics: it has Finvoice as its own network, as well as being reachable over Peppol.

Which networks you can set up yourself depends on who operates them behind the scenes. The + Add network wizard shows you the current list for your entity's country, so treat that as the source of truth if this table and the product ever disagree.

# Adding a network to an entity

1. Go to Settings (gear icon) → Entities

2. Click an entity to open it. If you are starting from scratch, create the entity first

3. In the E-invoicing section, click + Add. If nothing has been set up yet you will see "No e-invoicing networks have been added"

4. The Add e-invoice network wizard opens with three steps:

   • Select network. Choose the network. Only networks valid for your entity's country appear, so a Greek entity sees myDATA and a German entity does not. If the network you want is one we operate for you, you will see a "Contact support" banner here instead of the usual fields
   • Verification. What happens here depends entirely on the network. See the table below
   • Status. Follow the registration through to completion

5. Back and Next move you through, and Done closes the wizard

You can register the same entity on more than one network by running the wizard once per network.

# What the verification step asks for

# Registration statuses

Every network shares the same set of statuses. Light re-checks registrations that are still in progress every 15 minutes, so a status can take a little while to catch up with reality.

Not every network passes through every status. Peppol, VeriFactu, France PA, Nemhandel and Finvoice all stop at Pending verification while their verification step completes. SDI skips it and goes straight from Created to Processing, because it has no verification step.

A registration can be waiting on you. If yours has sat at Pending verification or Processing for a while, check whether the network needs a step from you. For Peppol, have you uploaded the proof-of-ownership document? For VeriFactu and France PA, has your representative opened the link and signed? For SDI there is nothing for you to do, so just wait. For myDATA, check where you are in the five-step process in the myDATA article, since it is usually the service agreement waiting to be signed. Reopen the registration in the entity's E-invoicing section to see what it is waiting for.

How long Processing lasts varies a lot by network. Peppol is usually quick once you have uploaded your document. myDATA is the slowest by a wide margin, because Greek law requires an authorisation in the tax portal and a signed service agreement before anything can go live, so expect weeks and read the myDATA article before you start. Italian public-sector invoices are a different kind of outlier, and the SDI article explains why.

# Invoice statuses

Separately from the registration, each invoice you send electronically carries its own status.

An invoice that stays at Sent has not failed. It is waiting on the network. Where a network takes a long time to confirm, that is noted in the network's own article.

# What you need before you start

Every network needs the entity's country and VAT number filled in before you can register.

Beyond that, requirements differ, and they apply at two different moments. Some block registration, others block your first invoice. Each network article lists both. The one to know about up front is France PA, which asks for considerably more than the others, so read its article before you start the wizard.

Most networks also need a business registration number on the entity before you can send, even though registration itself does not require one.

# EAS codes and e-invoice addresses

An EAS code says what kind of identifier an e-invoice address is: a company registration number, a VAT number, a public-sector routing ID. The address is the identifier itself. Together they tell a delivery network where to send a document.

These appear in two places in Light, and they behave differently.

On your entity, filled in for you. When a registration completes on a network that issues an address, Light writes the EAS code and e-invoice address onto the entity and shows them read-only. You never type them in. On networks that do not issue an address, both stay empty, and that is correct.

On your customers, you fill these in. Each customer record has an E-invoice network, an EAS code and an E-invoice address. This is how Light knows where to send that customer's invoices. On Peppol, an invoice cannot be sent without all three.

A few common EAS codes:

• 0007 for a Swedish organisation number
• 0096 for a Danish CVR number
• 0184 for the Danish Public Sector (DIGSTORG)
• 0192 for a Norwegian organisation number
• 0208 for a Belgian enterprise number
• 9930 for a German VAT number
• 0204 for a German Leitweg-ID, used for German public-sector customers

Light supports the full Peppol EAS code list, so you can search for the right one on the customer form. The Peppol article has a country-by-country reference for which code to use.

The code that identifies a company on the document and the code that routes it across the network are not always the same. The Peppol article explains when they differ and why it matters.

# Setting up EDIFACT codes on tax codes

An EDIFACT code classifies how a line is treated for VAT: standard-rated, exempt, reverse charge, and so on. Every e-invoicing network needs this classification, so every tax code you use on an e-invoice needs the field set.

1. Go to Settings (gear icon) → Tax codes
2. Click + Create tax code, or open an existing one
3. Choose the right EDIFACT (optional) code
4. Save

The available codes:

Despite the "(optional)" label on the field, an invoice using a tax code with no EDIFACT code set will be blocked once the entity is registered for e-invoicing. Each network turns these codes into its own local classification differently, and the network articles have the mapping where it matters.

# Entities with more than one network

An entity can hold several registrations at once, and a Greek or Italian entity often will: one for its domestic obligation and one for cross-border trade.

Normally the customer's E-invoice network decides where their invoice goes.

There is one exception. If the entity has a completed SDI registration, every e-invoice it issues goes through SDI, whatever the customer's network is set to. This is not a bug. Italy requires all of a resident business's invoices to pass through SDI for clearance, including cross-border ones. If you have an Italian entity that also holds a Peppol registration, expect SDI to win.

Entities in the same group can be registered on completely different networks. Registration follows the entity's jurisdiction, not your organisation's.

# Receiving e-invoices

Registration is not only about sending. On the networks that support it, e-invoices your suppliers send you are collected automatically and turned into bills in Light. Which networks those are is in the table above.

If you only ever need to send, some networks offer a Sending only registration type, which skips the receiving setup. It is available on every network except France PA. Choosing it also leaves any existing receiving arrangement untouched, so an entity can send through one route while continuing to receive through another.

# FAQ and troubleshooting

The network I want is not in the dropdown.

The list is filtered by your entity's country, so check the entity's address first. If the network is one we operate for you, such as Nemhandel or Portuguese Tax Reporting, it will not appear at all. Contact support.

My registration says Error.

The reason is shown on the registration. For Peppol, the usual cause is a verification document that does not clearly show ownership of the company. Use Retry verification to send a better one.

My invoice will not send.

The message names the field that is missing. Most often it is an EDIFACT code on a tax code, or the customer's EAS code and e-invoice address. Check the customer record before the entity, because customer-side fields are the more common cause.

My entity has no e-invoice address after registering.

On a reporting network that is expected, because there is nothing to address. Check which kind of network you are on in the table above.

# Related articles

• Peppol e-invoicing
• SDI e-invoicing in Italy
• VeriFactu e-invoicing in Spain
• France PA e-invoicing
• Nemhandel e-invoicing in Denmark
• EHF e-invoicing in Norway
• Greek myDATA e-invoicing
• Managing Entities
• Tax and VAT Configuration