If you invoice from France or from Spain, electronic invoicing is no longer a plan on a slide. France has set 1 September 2026 as the date from which every VAT-registered business must be able to receive structured electronic invoices. Spain runs two separate rules whose calendars have shifted more than once. Neither country lets a PDF count as an electronic invoice.
France: receiving comes before sending
From 1 September 2026, every business established in France and liable for VAT must be able to receive structured electronic invoices, whatever its size. Large companies and mid-caps must also send them from that date. Small firms, sole traders and micro-businesses get an extra year: their obligation to send starts on 1 September 2027, alongside e-reporting.
The VAT franchise does not exempt you
This is the most common misunderstanding in France. A micro-entrepreneur under the base franchise is still liable for VAT even if not required to charge it — and it is liability, not charging, that triggers the obligation. Only activities exempt by nature, such as medical or teaching work, fall outside. The invoice wording changes nothing about how it must now be transmitted.
Spain: two rules, constantly confused
Spain runs Verifactu, which governs the invoicing software itself — each invoice must produce a chained, signed, unalterable record — and separately the Crea y Crece law, which governs the format and channel of business-to-business invoices. They are different obligations with different calendars, and most businesses will end up meeting both.
Spanish dates have moved more than once
Both Spanish rules have been postponed, and the implementing regulation has kept changing. Entry into force is staged by company size, largest first and sole traders last. Before planning anything, check the latest official publication from the tax agency or ask your accountant: the dates circulating online are frequently out of date.
What it changes in your daily work
The real benefit is not compliance, it is what compliance makes possible. A structured invoice no longer has to be keyed in again: the data arrives readable by your system. Reconciliation, filing and payment tracking stop being manual. Many firms will install a platform to comply, then carry on copying everything by hand — and miss the part that mattered.
Where to start, in practice
Ask your accountant first whether the software you already use meets the requirements: many vendors have updated their products without telling their customers. Then decide who receives the invoices, who approves them and how errors get fixed. That internal organisation is what is most often missing, and no tool solves it on its own.
This reform is a good moment to look at what your invoicing actually costs you in time. We have built a free diagnostic that works it out in two minutes: four questions, the result on screen, and it tells you whether automating that task is worth it or not. Sometimes the answer is no, and it says so too. For dates and your own situation, your accountant remains the right person to ask.