Belgium's federal government received its first completely electronic invoice - not a PDF, but invoice data defined in the Universal Business Language standard, on 8 July. Belgium's e-invoicing system is based on e-Prior, the e-invoicing platform developed by the European Commission, which is made available as open source.
The first invoice was sent by Electrabel, a supplier of electricity and gas. The data was sent using Mercurius, the e-invoicing platform serviced by Fedict, the federal governments ICT service provider. The invoice is automatically inserted into Fedcom, the accounting system of the country's federal government.
The sending of this invoice marks the start of a six-month pilot of the Belgium government's e-invoice platform.
The e-invoice service is currently open to invited suppliers, who can submit their invoices electronically, either directly or by using a web-portal, to three departments, the Budget and Management Control department, Fedict and the Chancellery of the Prime Minister.
All together now
Upon successful completion of this test, the project will be gradually extended to include other federal departments and suppliers. The federal government hopes regional and local governments will join this system, aiming to provide a single point for suppliers of the Belgian governments to send their invoices.
When the European directive on e-Invoicing in public procurement is accepted, all European governments will be obliged to be able to receive invoices electronically, by 2020 at the latest.
Interoperability
Open e-PRIOR is an open-source e-procurement platform that allows practical implementation of interoperable electronic services within any public administration. The platform has been developed under the ISA (Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations) programme, by the Directorate-General for Informatics (DIGIT) of the European Commission and it was deployed within DIGIT in 2009.
More information:
Press release (in Dutch)
Press release (in French)
Open e-PRIOR