Regulatory updates - Estonia

The Act makes Estonia yet another European country to go beyond the requirements on Directive 2014/55/EU and extend the e-invoicing mandate as well on suppliers.

The timelines of the mandates will be as follows:

• From April 2019: all contracting authorities are obliged to be able to receive e-invoices that comply with the European Norm
• From July 2019: all invoices to the public sector can only be sent as e-invoices compatible with the European Norm

The Estonian Center of Registers and Information Systems (RIK) maintains the government-owned infrastructure (e-Financials) that performs the service of receiving and sending e-invoices and accompanying documents between suppliers and public contracting authorities. RIK will be accepting e-invoices that comply with EN 16931-1, i.e. UBL 2.1 or CII and the Official Estonian e-invoice standard EVS 923: 2014 / AC: 2017

Companies and institutions can use the state register “Register of E-Invoice Recipients”, where all organisations receiving e-invoices (business and non-profit associations, foundations and state and local government agencies) are registered. The register lists all necessary information to electronically transmit invoices to registered companies/institutions.

Estonia’s approach to e-invoicing is however decentralised, whereby contracting authorities can contract an e-invoicing service provider of their choosing to receive e-invoices compatible with the European Norm instead of being connected to the central platform.

Pagero offers the necessary network reach to exchange e-invoices with the Estonian public sector.