Validating an existing e-invoice

The first of two routes through the portal: validate an existing e-invoice before the recipient rejects it. Takes about five minutes and needs no account.

Step by step

1. Open the tool. Click the “Validate e-invoice” tile on the start page, or go straight to /en/validate.
2. Provide the file. Via “Choose file” — drag and drop works as well — or by pasting XML into the text box below. Accepted extensions are .xml, .erb, .ubl, .cii, .p7m and .pdf. Upper limit: 15 MB per file.
3. Validate. The format is detected from the document itself — there is no selector for it.
4. Read the validation report. At the top it says “Compliant” or “Not compliant”, next to it the detected format, below it the validation level along with the number of errors and warnings. The table lists Rule, Severity, Message and Location for each finding. Below that, the page also renders the same invoice legibly.
5. Carry on. Two buttons lead onwards from here: “Validate another” and — as soon as a format has been detected — “Convert now”. If the invoice is faulty, “Correct invoice” appears as well: the create form opens prefilled with everything the file already carries.

Error or warning — the difference matters

An error is a breach of a binding rule: the invoice counts as non-compliant and will be rejected by the recipient. A warning is a pointer and does not change the status. The status at the top reads “Compliant” exactly when no finding has the severity error.

“Validated” does not mean “valid”

Only the status at the top says that. And the validation level belongs in every record: a “Compliant” from the arithmetic consistency check is a different assurance from one issued by the EN 16931 validator. Which format is checked along which route is set out under Validation and compliance.

Hybrid PDF and ordinary PDF

A ZUGFeRD/Factur-X hybrid PDF is accepted: its embedded XML is extracted and then validated. An ordinary PDF invoice, by contrast, yields no report — it contains no structured data. The page says so and offers “PDF to e-invoice”; the file is carried over, so a second upload is not needed.

If you convert afterwards

The source format is detected automatically again; you only choose the target format. The result is re-validated and the report shown alongside. If the source document lacks something the target format requires, the page states the number of missing mandatory entries and offers “Add missing details”.

Everything about validating in detail — the three validation routes, repaired documents, the limits — is under Validating.