Hungary mandates e-invoicing for energy sectors (Jan 1, 2025) impacting suppliers, distributors, and non-consumers, requiring VAT-compliant digital archiving.
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Hungary is expanding its digital tax framework, mandating e-invoicing for its energy sector from January 1, 2025. This significant shift requires businesses to adapt to new electronic invoicing and archiving protocols.
Effective January 1, 2025, Hungary will extend its e-invoicing mandate to encompass all business transactions within the electricity and natural gas sectors. This new regulation will impact a broad spectrum of entities operating in these crucial industries, including suppliers, traders, distributors, and transmission system operators, as well as various non-consumer organizations. The initial timeline for this implementation was adjusted following valuable feedback received from industry stakeholders, indicating a collaborative approach to this significant regulatory change. Businesses within these sectors must now prepare for the transition to mandatory electronic invoicing.
Under this new mandate, affected businesses will retain a degree of flexibility in the specific electronic invoice formats they choose to adopt. The Hungarian Tax Authority has approved several formats, including UBL 2.1, UN/CEFACT CII, PEPPOL BIS 3.0, and signed PDFs. Regardless of the chosen format, all e-invoices must be stored in a manner that fully complies with existing Value Added Tax (VAT) regulations. Importantly, the current regulatory framework does not prescribe a specific e-invoicing format or a particular exchange method, allowing businesses to select solutions that best integrate with their existing operational and technological infrastructures.
Hungary has already established a real-time transaction reporting (RTIR) system in 2018, which utilizes the NAV Online Számla system for the real-time collection of VAT data through XML transmissions. While e-invoicing has largely remained optional for most sectors, compliance with the RTIR system has been mandatory for ensuring the validation of tax data. A key distinction exists regarding digital signatures, which are only required for invoices issued in PDF format, whereas XML invoices undergo instant validation through the RTIR submissions. Furthermore, all e-invoices are subject to a secure archiving requirement for a minimum period of eight years.
Hungary's progressive move towards mandatory e-invoicing in the energy sector, coupled with its existing RTIR system, signals a clear trajectory towards a fully digitalized tax and transaction landscape.