French regulation starting january 1st 2018

Self-Hosted | v4/Legacy
1

Hello

Following a previous post, here is the legal information.
https://www.service-public.fr/professionnels-entreprises/actualites/A10279

This is a Google Translate sorry :wink:

English version :

In order to combat VAT fraud linked to the use of software allowing the concealment of receipts, the Finance Act for 2016 introduces the obligation from 2018 for traders and other professionals subject to VAT to register payments from their clients using secure and certified accounting software or cash systems.

This obligation will make it impossible to evade the fraud, which consists in reconstituting fraudulent receipts with cash vouchers to subtract cash payments from accounting revenue.

From 1 January 2018, the use of management software or a cash register system meeting the conditions of inalterability, security, storage and archiving of data, certified by a certificate issued by an accredited body or by an individual certificate issued by the publisher.

The tax administration has also specified the conditions that must be fulfilled by the software and cash systems, the means of justifying compliance with the obligation and the terms of the specific control procedure.

The administration expressly states that the obligation applies to all taxable persons who register their customers’ regulations in an accounting or management software or a cash register system, whether natural or legal persons, by law. private or public law, and even if they carry out all or part of transactions exempt from VAT or if they fall under the basic franchise regime.

In the event of a check, the absence of a certificate will be subject to a fine of € 7,500 per software or non-certified system, the offender having to regularize his situation within 60 days.

In some cases, taxable persons will be able to comply with this new obligation by simply updating their cash register software, as part of a maintenance contract subscribed during the purchase of the software.

French version :

Afin de lutter contre la fraude à la TVA liée à l'utilisation de logiciels permettant la dissimulation de recettes, la loi de finances pour 2016 instaure l'obligation à partir de 2018 pour les commerçants et autres professionnels assujettis à la TVA d'enregistrer les paiements de leurs clients au moyen d'un logiciel de comptabilité ou d'un systÚme de caisse sécurisés et certifiés.

Cette obligation permettra de rendre impossible la fraude qui consiste à reconstituer par un logiciel frauduleux des tickets de caisse pour soustraire des paiements en espÚces des recettes de la comptabilité.

À partir du 1er janvier 2018, devient obligatoire l’utilisation d’un logiciel de gestion ou d’un systĂšme de caisse satisfaisant aux conditions d’inaltĂ©rabilitĂ©, de sĂ©curisation, de conservation et d’archivage des donnĂ©es, attestĂ©es par un certificat dĂ©livrĂ© par un organisme accrĂ©ditĂ© ou par une attestation individuelle dĂ©livrĂ©e par l’éditeur.

L’administration fiscale a par ailleurs prĂ©cisĂ© les conditions que doivent remplir les logiciels et systĂšmes de caisse, les moyens de justifier du respect de l’obligation et les modalitĂ©s de la procĂ©dure de contrĂŽle spĂ©cifique.

L’administration prĂ©cise expressĂ©ment que l’obligation concerne tous les assujettis Ă  la TVA qui enregistrent les rĂšglements de leurs clients dans un logiciel de comptabilitĂ© ou de gestion ou un systĂšme de caisse qu’il s’agisse de personnes physiques ou morales, de droit privĂ© ou de droit public, et mĂȘme s’ils rĂ©alisent en tout ou partie des opĂ©rations exonĂ©rĂ©es de TVA ou s’ils relĂšvent du rĂ©gime de la franchise en base.

En cas de contrĂŽle, l’absence d’attestation sera soumise Ă  une amende de 7 500 € par logiciel ou systĂšme non certifiĂ©, le contrevenant devant rĂ©gulariser sa situation dans les 60 jours.

Dans certains cas, les assujettis pourront se mettre en conformitĂ© avec cette nouvelle obligation grĂące Ă  une simple mise Ă  jour de leur logiciel de caisse, dans le cadre d’un contrat de maintenance souscrit lors de l’achat du logiciel.

2

Thanks, are there changes needed to the app?

3

There might be some things to do i think, However, texts are always complicated and numerous


http://bofip.impots.gouv.fr/bofip/10691-PGP.html?identifiant=BOI-TVA-DECLA-30-10-30-20160803

I’ll try to check what is the most important and what should be necessary not to be punished in case of control (i don’t really want to pay 7500€ just because of stupid work inspector
)

Any comments from other french users will be welcome to help. Anyway, I think that most of what we have in the next will, sooner or later, also be for other countries (at least UE) as it is for governement to deal against fiscal fraud


4

Hi,

From 1 January 2018, the use of management software or a cash register system meeting the conditions of inalterability, security, storage and archiving of data, certified by a certificate issued by an accredited body or by an individual certificate issued by the publisher.

Invoice Ninja just have to make sure that invoices are inalterable, secured, well stored and archived. I think that the invoice preview should let appear a “PREVIEW” watermark at 45° in the middle to make sure that we can’t use the invoice until it has been saved.

Most important : once an invoice has been issued, it shouldn’t be able to change the content.

Then, Invoice Ninja can issue a self-made certificat claiming that the invoices inalterability etc. are certified by the publisher. Like This : “name of CEO, director of Invoice Ninja, certify that the invoice hosted by our service are unalterable
” than sign and distribute to your clients, and that’s all.

5

I live in the USA and when I try to print invoices I get the watermark. Any way to make it go away since I mainly run a paper based business.

6

The ‘preview’ watermark should be removed once the invoice is saved.

7

Hi I just tested that feature and it does not really comply with french regulation. Once the invoice has been saved/sent it should not be possible to change/alter its content anymore, which is currently the case.
Also every invoice needs a changelog with date and time which must be accessible if there is a control showing any changes if there have been corrections to the invoice.

So if you made a wrong invoice you need to make a credit invoice first for the wrong invoice and then make a new invoice.

So at the moment the Invoice Ninja does not comply at all with french law and any french company that uses it will get in trouble.

8

Can you clarify, which ‘feature’ are you referring to.

If you’re self hosting the app you can use the ‘lock invoices’ feature (http://docs.invoiceninja.com/en/latest/configure.html#lock-invoices). If you’re using the hosted version one option may be to attach the PDF to emails and set a BCC email address to receive all client emails.

We track all changes to an invoice, you can see the changes by clicking ‘More actions’ then ‘View History’.

9

Hi I am on the hosted version. I was talking about the preview watermark feature, expecting once the invoice was saved/send the invoice would no longer be editable. But that is still the case when you open it again. And this is against the french law. So yes for self hosting your suggestion is the correct way to achieve this.

Also being able to delete an invoice is against french law. When the invoice is wrong you have to issue a credit note which will set the balance straight. So normally in an European invoice system you have beside Quotes and Invoices also the Credit Note/ Credit invoices feature which have their own numbering system. With Invoice Ninja my work around was creating an invoice an changing its invoice number into something like Credit-001 but this would not be allowed/feasible if Invoice Ninja would comply with the french law.

One thing which is also a risk for European user (at least Germans and French) is that you can freely edit the invoice numbers and invoice dates. This also might be an issue as it allows you to “replace” and “delete” invoices in a certain way.

All french/german systems would always create a not alterable invoice number and check that the invoice dates are chronologically right compared to the previous invoice. The system would not allow you to create an invoice with a date earlier to the previous invoice. e.g Invoice n21 with a date 23rd march 2018 and Invoice n22 with a date 19th march 2018 is not possible. The system should only allow you to pick the 23rd or later for the invoice number 22.

Don’t get me wrong I really like Invoice Ninja and have been using it for quite some time, but the risk of a 7.500 Euro penalty for using a non certified system is currently far too high. I guess even if you would comply with all the french rules as long as Invoice Ninja is not certified I guess the french authorities will give the companies using it a hard time to prove that it complies with the new regulations.

10

We appreciate your input! We take these regulations seriously and do everything we can to meet them.

We support credit notes. You can enable the counter on /settings/invoice_settings#credit_number, it’s automatically used when the invoice is negative.

It isn’t clear to me that the new regulations would require us to enforce invoice number validity in the app.

We’re actively working on GDPR compliance, I think it should satisfy “individual certificate issued by the publisher”.

11

Hello Hillel,

Is there information available about the encryption?
What details are encrypted? It would be nice if all client details are encrypted (not only the password).
If im right this is not required by the GDPR, but is preferred

I have (quickly) searched, but couldn’t find info about it :slight_smile:

Thanks for making (and updating!!) InvoiceNinja, I have moved here from InvoiceNinja, and love the amount of support

12

All passwords use a one-way encryption. The following data uses a two-way encryption: payment gateways credentials, bank account usernames and the two factor secret.

If the client details were encrypted how would searching work?

13

Thanks for the info.
That is indeed a problem, it would probably not work if it is all encrypted :slight_smile: