Legal & Regulatory Aspectsof E-Invoicing

2009 ICH User Group

Michael Uebber, LH

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Legal & Regulatory Aspects The “Legal” Invoice

Reference Information Digital Signature Footer Text E-Archiving

Value Added Taxes

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The “Legal” Invoice

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The “Legal” Invoice Reference Information Digital Signature Footer Text E-Archiving

A note about legal compliance

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Reference Information In many countries, a legal invoice requires a set of key fields such as

address, VAT registration number, etc It would be difficult for a billing entity to keep this information up-to-date for

all potential billed entities All SIS participants will be required to enter this type of data in their Member

Profile Includes the necessary data to make an invoice legal by default

Invoice can be loaded by the airline in full, or can be built by SIS using default data from the reference tables

SIS will be mandated by participants to fill in any missing info on submission on both the “from” and “to” sides of an invoice

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Digital Signature Some jurisdictions require a digital signature to be attached to an invoice

before it can be considered “legal” Every participant will update their member profile to specify if they need

digital signatures on the outgoing or incoming invoice, or both Before settlement, IS will, on behalf of the participants, create any

necessary digital signature The digital signature will be downloadable for storage

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Footer Text Some jurisdictions require specific text printed on the invoice, in addition to

the reference fields (name, address, VAT registration #, etc.) For example, Germany requires a list of the company CEO and other

information

To facilitate this without creating many new XML fields, there are two lines of footer text The billing party can supply this (or pre-define it as part of a location)

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E-Archiving Jurisdictions may require storage of digital invoices for varying amounts of

time During this time, the invoices and any applicable digital signature needs to

be accessible for any audits, sometimes stored in the local country While a participant will be able to download the invoice and digital signature

for local storage, they can also optionally mandate that Integrated Settlement stores it on their behalf for as long as needed

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A note about legal compliance Legal invoice can be either the data file or the PDF, but only one of them

can be the original Integrated Settlement will provide the tools (some of which are detailed on

the previous slides) that will help your company ensure legal compliance with regards to invoices

However, it will be your company’s responsibility to know the local laws and enable the options which will make your invoices compliant

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Value Added Taxes

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Value Added Taxes The new record types (IS-IDEC, IS-XML, and IS-WEB) will support Value

Added Taxes on all records VAT can be added to an existing record/invoice (e.g. a prime coupon) or a

separate invoice can be created with just VAT records VAT can be named anything on an invoice (GST, QST, etc) – it’s just a label

Any combination of VATs can be added, with specified percentages

It will be your company’s responsibility to determine whether VAT applies, how much it should be, and where to put it

SIS will validate the integrity of your invoice, not the validity of your submission

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VATs vs. TFCs Value Added Taxes are not the same as Taxes, Fees, and Charges

VAT – An indirect tax levied by governments, with legislation requiring charging and display on the invoice

TFC – Arbitrary interlineable taxes. Might be levied by an airport.

VATs and TFCs are provided separately in the data file supplied by the participant (or via IS-WEB)

The invoice template will respect the data file and display the VATs and TFCs separately, and ensure that they’re labeled appropriately

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Questions?

Email:

sis@iata.org

SIS Website:

www. t .oria a g.s si