Archiving Check Outgoing Invoices

Audit-proof archiving of digital outgoing invoices – requirements, risks, and solutions

Immutability and timely archiving:
Outgoing invoices are often archived late or manually. Changes to invoice content or metadata are not sufficiently logged. This contradicts the principle of immutability and can lead to objections.

Process documentation:
A current and complete documentation of archiving processes, systems, and responsibilities is often lacking. This complicates the burden of proof to the tax authorities and increases the risk during audits.

Traceability and completeness:
Archiving does not always include all tax-relevant information, such as missing technical metadata. Without complete documentation, traceability is at risk.

Availability and readability:
Archived outgoing invoices must remain readable and retrievable even in the event of system changes or format modifications. In many cases, there is no technical concept for long-term availability, for example due to missing migration strategies or insufficient safeguards against accidental deletion.

As-is analysis of archiving process and software:
We examine your existing archiving processes and the software used with regard to technical and organizational requirements.

Legal requirements:
We check whether all tax-relevant information is completely and correctly transferred to the archive. We also analyze whether the invoice creation systems ensure audit-proof transfer to the archive, whether the statutory retention period is guaranteed, and whether a compliant process documentation is available.

Assessment:
We identify typical weaknesses within the archiving process. These include, among others, inadequately designed control mechanisms and delayed or incomplete archiving of outgoing invoices.

Results documentation:
The results of our analysis are summarized in a structured report. This contains a well-founded assessment of the current archiving status, an overview of identified risks, and concrete recommendations for optimization.

If desired, we also support companies in selecting a suitable archiving solution. For this, we use a proven, structured approach with which we systematically assess the professional, technical, and organizational requirements. On this basis, we actively support the selection process from requirements definition through the evaluation of potential providers to the final decision. Our focus is always on compliance with legal requirements, the long-term viability of the solution, and its seamless integration into existing IT and process landscapes.