GoBD: Electronic archiving and the legal, technical and practical requirements

Satisfy compliance requirements

The GoBD determine, which requirements the state has for proper IT-based accounting and for audit-proof eletrionic archiving of tax-relevant records, and how those can be implemented with software systems.
After § 416 ZPO printed invoices are certificates. They have to be safe from manipulation and kept as originals. A distruction of the original document is allowed, but only if the procedure is GoBD-compliant. There have to be certain internal controls and the procedure has to be documented.

Legal requirements for electronic documents, e.g. for emails with pdf, edi or ZUGFeRD invoices.

They are determined in the GoBD: if the email is only being used a usual mean of information transport, it doesn´t have to be stored. Does the email contain important data, you can store them audit-proof together with the electronic invoice by using the inPuncto software. A GoBD procedure is necessary when storing electronic invoices. There have to be certain internal controls and the procedure has to be documented. This is also determined in the GoBD.

In our video about audit-proof archiving we show you the legal requirement after the new GoBD as well as the differences to the requirements for printed documents and invoices. (English version cooming soon, thank you for your patience).

The GoBD also determines different technical requirements for a system.

Transperency is very important, meaning the question about how to work with older versions and systems. The practical requirement for audit-proof systems are correctness, completeness, safety, protection against change or distortion, protection against loss, compliance of a retention period, documentation of the procedure, transparency and verifiability.

The inPuncto software is certified after IDW PS 880 and FAIT 3. That mean, that an accountant has checked and confirmed, that our software meets the legal requirements for electronic archiving systems, and that correctness and system safety are guaranteed.