Spain: These are the requirements of the computer or electronic billing systems and programs

Spain - 12 / 12 / 2023

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Royal Decree 1007/2023 regulates the new requirements of systems and programs for billing processes and standardize formats for billing records.

Royal Decree 1007/2023, of December 5, 2023, approving the Regulations which set out the requirements to be met by computer or electronic systems and programs which support the billing processes of traders and professionals, and for the standardization of billing record formats, has been published in the Official State Gazette of December 6, 2023.

These regulations implement the provisions of General Tax Law 58/2003 (LGT) on billing systems, with a twofold objective:

On the one hand, the regulations:
1. Set out the requirements to be met by computerized billing systems used by traders and professionals (as we shall see, the requirements do not apply to those which submit their VAT books through the website of the State Tax Agency – AEAT– using the system known as the immediate information sharing system – SII-), in order to ensure “the integrity, preservation, accessibility, readability, traceability and inalterability of the billing records”.
2. Ensure that all commercial transactions generate an invoice and an entry in the taxpayer’s computer system, preventing the subsequent alteration of those entries and permitting, as appropriate, the simultaneous or subsequent submission of the information to the tax authorities, which may be done voluntarily in an automatic manner by electronic means.
On the other hand, the regulations establish obligations for producers, manufacturers, sellers or developers of the computerized systems, which must certify that their computer systems meet the requirements established in the legislation.

The main characteristics of the obligations implemented by these regulations are summarized in this document.