Cheaper E-invoices

Electronic invoicing was the topic discussed on 18. April, at the conference organised by ECR Hungary. Ferenc Balogh, general secretary of ECR Hungary spoke about the inevitable success of electronic invoicing as a result of a HUF 200 saving per invoice, compared to paper invoices. A total of EUR 483 billion could be saved this way in Europe, which translates to a saving of HUF 851 billion for Hungary. Péter Polgár, vice president of APEH expressed the view that they welcome electronic invoicing and would be partners in promoting its use. .While there were only 75,000 companies which submitted their tax returns in electronic form in 2006, this number is 600,000 at present. APEH increasingly uses electronic services. Like online auctions. According to José María Cervera, a co-president of ECR and managing director of Metro Kereskedelmi Kft., electronic invoicing is guarantee of efficient service. He believes, that incentives should be provided for all parties to adopt electronic invoicing and efficiency is the strongest argument. László Csorba talked about electronic invoices based on Electronic Data Interchange. This system, where data is exchanged without human interference can also be used for sending orders. Specialised EDI service providers exist, who can perform these tasks under contract. 65 per cent of the orders are processed by this system in Metro at present, and this percentage will reach 80 by the end of the year. While only 1 per cent of invoicing is done through the EDI system at the moment, they plan to boost this percentage to 85 by 2010.