The Romanian Ministry of Finance announces new plans to extend mandatory B2B e-invoicing, which will start in July 2024, to B2C transactions.
It is expected that in July 2024, at the same time as mandatory B2B e-invoicing starts in Romania, the voluntary period for B2C transactions will start, which is expected to become mandatory in January 2025.
As part of the digital reporting requirements and the ViDA project, Romania will have to harmonise its centralised settlement model with the reforms proposed by the EU by 2035.
B2B E-invoicing in Romania
From 1 July 2022, B2B e-invoicing will be mandatory in Romania for the following high-risk products: fruit and vegetables, alcoholic beverages, new construction, mineral products, clothing and footwear..
The following assets were added to this group on 1 March 2024, in accordance with the provisions of Emergency Ordinance 115/2023:
- Meat and edible organs.
- Fish, crustaceans and molluscs.
- Milk and milk products; birds' eggs; natural honey; and edible products of animal origin, not elsewhere specified or included.
- Unmanufactured tobacco, raw tobacco and tobacco refuse; other manufactured tobacco and tobacco substitutes; homogenised or reconstituted tobacco, tobacco extracts and essences.
- Tobacco products or substitutes for tobacco and/or nicotine, tobacco intended for inhalation without burning; and other nicotine-containing products intended for the absorption of nicotine in the human body.
Nevertheless, for the majority of taxpayers, the introduction of mandatory e-invoicing in Romania is anticipated to commence in 2024.
In fact, in October 2023, the legislation for implementing B2B e-invoicing was approved and its implementation was defined in two stages.
- January 2024. A system for the real-time submission of invoices has been implemented, with a duration spanning from 1 January to 31 June. In order to comply with the regulations, invoices must be submitted in XML format via the Romanian e-invoice system (Ro e-invoice).
- From July 2024, the submission of pre-clearance e-invoices through the eFactură platform will become mandatory. Consequently, the acceptance of paper invoices for tax compliance purposes will no longer be permitted.
Background on e-invoicing in Romania
In July 2022, Romania launched its e-invoicing massification process. From this date, different groups of taxpayers were obligated to submit their invoices electronically through the national platform RO e-Factura.
The Ministry of Finance and the National Agency for Financial Administration (ANAF) introduced the new e-invoicing system in 2020, which became a reality with the publication of Government Ordinance 120/2021.
Initially, road haulage companies were the first to be required, followed by a gradual extension of the obligation to other sectors.
In addition, the Romanian government adopted Law 139/2022 to ensure compliance with Directive 2014/55/EU, which requires e-invoicing for Romanian public administrations.
How does the e-invoicing system work in Romania?
All invoices must be transmitted via the centralised RO e-Invoice platform and must be generated in UBL format, in accordance with the RO_CIUS standard. Prior to this, taxpayers are required to register on ANAF's online platform.
Subsequent to the electronic transmission of the invoice, the platform will assign an identification number to the invoice. The system will perform a series of validations on the documents, both syntactic and semantic. Once the invoice has been validated, the system will generate an automatic response.
If the validation is successful, the signature of the Ministry of Finance will be applied, thereby guaranteeing that no changes have been made to the content of the invoice.
Both issuers and recipients are required to retain electronic invoices for a minimum of 10 years, with the exception of invoices pertaining to capital goods, which must be retained for a period of 25 years.
In response to the concerns of taxpayers in the jurisdiction, the Ministry of Finance has implemented improvements to the national e-invoicing system. These modifications include the removal of the possibility of issuing duplicate invoices, which will be rejected outright, and the introduction of the option of self-invoicing.
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