1. E-Invoicing: Business requirements
and the market situation
for SME (in Austria)
Gerhard Laga
•EU Expert Group on e-invoicing, subchair on business requirements
•Austrian Federal Economic Chamber (WKÖ), Head of E-Center
•AUSTRIAPRO, Head of E-Invoicing working group

2. Background
n Membership by law, ~400.000 members, 95% SME
n “The Austrian Chambers of Commerce represent
the interests of business, promote the economy
and communicate knowledge.
In this sense, we feel we have a sociopolitical
duty towards the citizens of this country.”
Dr. Christoph Leitl, President of the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber
n WKÖ: Promotes E-Invoicing since 2007, demands equal
treatment and quick transposition in Austrian Law
n AUSTRIAPRO: developed simple XML-structure
„ebInterface“ together with Austrian Businesses
and (public) Administration

3. The current situation of SMEs (in Austria)
n Annual study with 1000 samples on ebusiness-topics
n E-Invoicing is an important topic also for SME:
very important for ~25% SME (~40% for bigger companies)
n ~ 50 % of SME use financial accounting software (~75%)
n ~ 40 % of SME use ERP-Software (~70%)
n ~ 60 % of SME do bookkeeping internally (~85%)
n ~ 75 % already received at least one E-Invoice
n ~ 20 % of invoices are received electronically
n ~ 90 % in PDF format, 17% .doc, 16% .xls, 12% .XML
n ~ 60 % of SME print and archive on paper (~30%)
n ~ 30 % know about compulsory digital signature

4. Challenges
n Build a simple, comprehensible legal situation
n Generate awareness about the real costs
of paper invoicing
n Explain the benefit of structured e-invoicing
n Provide a simple, open, unambiguous invoice
structure to be implemented by the software
industry
n Give help for the first steps
n Educate users to be able to choose from the
software or solution market

5. Service of Chamber of Commerce
www.wko.at/e-rechnung
n Free Information
§ 2 brochures and 2 e-consulting-systems
§ E-invoicing will be one of the contents of TELEFIT, the biggest IT-
roadshow in Austria
§ National contact point for CEN E-invoicing gateway
§ Annual study on e-invoicing market
n Free Software
§ generate ebInterface XML online and offline
eg plugin for MS Word 2007
§ check and visualize signature and ebInterface structure
n Motivate and communicate to use structured e-invoicing
§ Austrian Ministry of Finance accepts e-invoices to federal
authorities only in ebInterface-format
§ City of Vienna will accept ebInterface invoices by mid 2010
§ big companies are implementing it now: Telekom Austria, Porsche
Austria, utility services etc..

6. Collaboration between users and providers
n AUSTRIAPRO provided a well known neutral platform in
collaboration with Chamber of Commerce -> technical
implementation body
§ 2005-2010: tested with SME and bigger organisations, feedback
implemented, now stable version ebInterface 3.0, ~250
consultants trained
n Chamber of Commerce representing users and tries to influence
legal development
n Government should provide legal clarity in a legal
implementation body
n Development of software-market:
§ first easy to use „cloud“-services for „business software“
available, including IPhone App, ~15€ pm
§ National and regional players for accounting software already
implemented ebInterface
§ international players start to show interest now

10. E-Invoicing future
n market growing fast, fees for paper invoices are
introduced
n depending on quick legal certainty on national level,
growth will stay or fall
n Business organizations are advised to give help to
micro enterprises
n AUSTRIAPRO and Chamber of Commerce are closely
watching international developments (CEFACT,
PEPPOL,…)
n As soon as there is an European XML structure on the
market(!), ebInterface will be updated/merged

11. Thank you for your attention!
Contact Information: Gerhard Laga
gerhard.laga@wko.at
+ 43 1 50105 4203