International trade compliance: France eInvoicing mandate

This legislation follows in the same direction that many businesses, national bodies, and countries are taking towards digital transformation. e-Invoicing is increasingly being mandated in countries to close what is known as the VAT gap.

The existing requirement for e-Invoice is currently solely related to B2G e-Invoicing, however, that will soon be rolled out across all business transactions in both private and public sectors. The new France e-Invoicing mandate relates to B2B eInvoicing and e-reporting (also referred to as CTC – Continuous Transaction Reporting).

In this blog you will learn:

The VAT gap is defined as the discrepancy between the expected VAT revenue and the amount actually collected.

The European Commission outlines several causes of the VAT gap, including; fraud and evasion, corporate bankruptcy, maladministration, legal tax optimisation, and corporate insolvency. Their VAT gap report outlines how this discrepancy affects countries across Europe, with France having a reported VAT gap of 8% (almost 14 EUR billion) in 2020.

The problem of resolving the VAT gap has become the target of legislation in recent years. Introducing e-Invoice mandates means governing bodies can effectively reduce the VAT gap and ensure an auditable, digitised paper trail. This has become a priority for the French government, as they have the second-largest absolute VAT gap in Europe (behind Italy – 26 EUR billion). However, France is but one of many countries that are introducing legislation to mandate e-Invoice transactions. Many other countries in Europe and beyond are also rapidly announcing changes to invoicing and reporting requirements.

As a result, Billentis* reports that eInvoice exchanges are expected to quadruple by 2035. This indicates that e-Invoicing capability will become necessary for many businesses to remain competitive within a globalised market.

e-Invoice legislation in France has been underway for quite some time. However, up until recently, it has only impacted specific business sectors and domestic trade.

A phased e-Invoice mandate for B2G transactions was rolled out between January 2017 (large organisations) and 2020 (all organisations).

The French tax authority, Délégation Générale des Finances Publiques (DGFiP), announced plans to expand this legislation to include all B2G and B2B transactions, both domestic and international in the coming years. As part of this legislation, all organisations in France, regardless of size, must be able to receive eInvoices by 1 September 2026 (although this deadline may be extended by decree, to 1st December 2026, at the latest). The mandated archiving period for these invoice documents is 10 years.

To support this new legislation, an invoicing platform named Chorus Pro was introduced by Agence pour l’Informatique Financière de l’État (AIFE) and other French governing bodies. This platform simplifies the submission of invoices, by allowing three different methods according to business preferences. These methods are: manual entry within the platform, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI), or Application Programming Interface (API). Chorus Pro supports several invoice standards:

The Chrous Pro platform is free of charge for any business partners to use. It can; facilitate Peppol access for cross-border exchanges, support electronic signatures, provide auto-completion functionality, and enable trading parties to communicate.

Organisations can meet the France e-Invoicing mandate with the support of a Plateforme de Dématérialisation Partenaire (PDP) e.g. an e-Invoicing service provider, such as Transalis.

France e-Invoicing legislation is being introduced in phases. The latest legislation regarding B2B e-Invoicing and e-reporting is being rolled out as follows:

Organisations affected by the September 2026 deadline may be able to extend the deadline by decree, up to 1st December 2026.

Transalis eInvoice™ provides businesses with flexible and scalable eInvoice solutions to meet any digital transformation requirement or mandated legislation.

For example, Transalis AR Automation offers businesses total flexibility to select the capabilities they need to trade with their supply chain network. This includes meeting international regulations, such as the new France e-Invoicing mandate, as well as PEPPOL connections, or even paper-to-digital functionality.

In addition to guaranteed regulatory compliance, businesses who implement a Transalis eInvoice™ solution will also benefit from:

Transalis eInvoice™ solutions are also PEPPOL compliant for European trade with both the public and private sectors. And Transalis is one of just 12 solutions providers worldwide to pass a rigorous new e-Invoicing standard as part of a consortium called EURINV19.