Europe's e-invoicing mandates are arriving. Your archive has to keep up.
One country at a time, paper and PDF invoices are being replaced by structured electronic invoices sent through state or network channels. The rules do not stop at sending: every e-invoice has to be archived, kept readable, and produced on demand for years.
An e-invoice you cannot produce in an audit is an e-invoice you never sent.
A continent moving to structured invoicing at once.
This is not one reform. It is a wave of separate national mandates, each with its own format, channel, and deadline, under one EU direction.
Driven by the EU VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA) reform and a row of national laws, most European tax authorities are making structured B2B e-invoicing mandatory. A structured e-invoice is machine-readable data (XML, or a hybrid PDF), not a scan or a regular PDF, so the tax administration can read it automatically.
For a business operating in several countries, the hard part is that the mandates do not align. Germany, France, Poland, Belgium, Romania, Italy, and Spain each run a different format, a different transmission model, and a different timeline. What they share is the obligation behind the invoice: keep it, intact and retrievable, for the full retention period.
Where each market stands in 2026.
A mid-2026 snapshot. Dates and thresholds have shifted before, so confirm the current rule for your country before you act.
Other markets (Croatia, Serbia, Portugal, Hungary, Greece, Turkey, and the Gulf) run their own systems. See the country guides on the blog for the local detail. All articles
Three shifts hide inside one mandate.
Sending an e-invoice is only the visible part. Two more obligations come with it.
A structured format, not a PDF
The invoice becomes machine-readable data (XML, or a hybrid like Factur-X and ZUGFeRD) built on the European EN 16931 standard, so the tax authority can process it without a human reading it.
A controlled channel, not email
The invoice travels through a defined route: a Peppol network, an accredited platform (a PDP in France), or a state clearing system (KSeF in Poland, SdI in Italy, e-Factura in Romania), not an attachment in your inbox.
Mandatory archiving, not a folder
Every issued and received e-invoice must be kept in its original structured form, readable and unaltered, for the legal retention period, and produced on demand in an audit. Storage is part of the mandate, not an afterthought.
Issuing is half the rule. Keeping the invoice is the other half.
Most of the noise is about how to send a compliant e-invoice. The quieter obligation, the one auditors actually test, is whether you can still produce it years later.
Across Europe, e-invoices must be retained for long periods, commonly eight to eleven years depending on the country, with their authenticity, integrity, and readability preserved the whole time. A structured XML that no current system can open, or one that was silently altered, fails the test even if the invoice was sent correctly.
The EU has now formalized this side too. Qualified electronic archiving became a regulated trust service under eIDAS 2.0, and Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2532 (in force 6 January 2026) sets the reference standards for it. Long-term, audit-proof archiving is moving from good practice to a defined EU framework.
This is where the e-invoicing project meets document archiving. Whatever channel you send through, the invoices have to land somewhere that keeps them encrypted, in the right jurisdiction, versioned, and retained to the legal clock, with a record of every access.
The compliant home for every invoice you send and receive.
Arhivix does not replace your e-invoicing channel. It is the archive underneath it, built for exactly this retention obligation.
Capture from the channel
Ingest issued and received e-invoices in their original structured form, whether they come from Peppol, a national platform, or your accounting software.
Store to the legal clock
Keep each invoice encrypted in the EU, versioned and unaltered, retained for the period your country requires, then disposed of on schedule with a record of the action.
Produce on demand
Find any invoice in seconds and hand an auditor a complete, readable, access-logged record, the evidence the mandate is really testing for.
Built around the standards the mandates use.
EN 16931 and the national formats, kept exactly as issued.
Frequently asked questions
What is a structured e-invoice, and is a PDF one?
A structured e-invoice is machine-readable data (typically XML, or a hybrid format like Factur-X or ZUGFeRD that carries XML inside a PDF) built on the EN 16931 standard. A plain PDF or a scan is not a structured e-invoice, because the tax authority cannot process it automatically.
How long do I have to keep e-invoices?
It depends on the country, but most of Europe requires invoices to be kept for around eight to eleven years, with their authenticity, integrity, and readability preserved the whole time. The original structured file, not just a printout, is what has to survive.
What is Peppol, and what is a clearing or PDP model?
Peppol is a European network for exchanging e-invoices through accredited access points. A clearing model (like Poland's KSeF, Italy's SdI, or Romania's e-Factura) routes invoices through a state platform, while France uses accredited private platforms called PDPs. They are different transmission channels for the same kind of structured invoice.
Does e-invoicing also mean I have to change how I archive?
Yes. Sending a compliant e-invoice and archiving it compliantly are two separate obligations. The structured invoice must be retained, unaltered and readable, for the legal period, which is why qualified electronic archiving is now a formal EU trust service under eIDAS 2.0.
I operate in several countries. Do I need one system per mandate?
You need to meet each country's sending rules, but you do not need a separate archive per country. A single compliant archive can hold invoices from every market in their original form, retained to each country's clock, which is the part Arhivix covers.
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