Topic overview

VAT identification (Vat ID) is a unique identification assigned by the European Union for companies that is relevant for tax purposes only within the EU.

Companies with a valid German Vat ID can have foreign Vat IDs validated under the confirmation procedure of the BZSt (Federal Central Tax Office). This can be performed via the Web form or alternatively, for companies with numerous confirmation queries, per program via the XML-RPC interface.

For companies with a valid Austrian VAT ID number, FinanzOnline AT provides a web service for the legally required online verification of VAT ID numbers via the BMF interface.

With the Vat ID confirmation function, Comarch Financials Enterprise offers the possibility of having both foreign and domestic Vat IDs of your external partners validated automatically via the BZSt-XML-RPC or BMF online interface.

This requires the home organization to have a valid German or Austrian Vat ID, which should be entered in the partner master of the organization. If this is the case, you can use the Partner Vat ID online validation batch application for automatically validating and confirming the foreign Vat IDs of external partners who are assigned to the home organization in the Financials. This is possible as a simple or as a qualified confirmation query.

The results of these validation and confirmation queries are saved individually and shown in the Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result application.

This article describes the preconditions and applications for using the Vat ID confirmation function within Comarch Financials Enterprise.

For more information on the confirmation procedure for foreign Vat IDs, refer to the online portal of the Federal Central Tax Office (BZSt) or FinanzOnline AT.

Settings

A separate license key is required for the Vat ID confirmation function. Only upon licensing can you activate the function, apply the necessary settings and use the Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result, Partner Vat ID online validation and Delete obsolete Vat IDs applications.

The required settings and master data are described below:

Customizing

First, the Vat ID confirmation function must be activated for the Financials framework in the Customizing application.

Various categories and parameters are available on the Settings tab. The settings made in Customizing serve to pre-assign the fields of the same name in the background applications Online Check Partner VAT ID and Delete obsolete VAT ID numbers. On the other hand, the settings allow test runs to be carried out as a time-controlled series.

General grouping

With this grouping, you specify the interface that should be used for the online check or confirmation request for the sales tax identification numbers. For organizations with a German sales tax identification number, this is the XML-RPC interface of the Federal Central Tax Office (BZSt). For organizations with an Austrian VAT identification number, the BMF interface of the FinanceOnline AT web service.

In addition, the confirmation method for the online validation should be selected. With the confirmation method, you can determine the scope of validation of the Vat IDs. If you select Simple confirmation, only the current validity of a Vat ID will be checked. If you select Qualified confirmation, also the provided information about the company’ s name (including legal form), registered office, postal code and street are compared against the registered data.

Using the Save result of each check field, it is possible to create historical results of the check of sales tax numbers. You can display these historical results in the Cockpit: Result of VAT ID Confirmation application.

In addition, you can define settings that enable a time-controlled check of the sales tax identification numbers. Use the Days since last order field to enter the number of days that should have passed since the last test order before a new test order is started.

The Maximum number of repetitions field controls how often a test job stored as a series is repeated before it is aborted. And with the setting in the Waiting time in minutes between repetitions field, you control after how many minutes a test job is repeated.

Sales orders grouping

Sales tax identification numbers that are contained in a sales order can be checked directly when saving the sales order, provided you have activated the Check sales orders field under this grouping. If the Generate warnings field is also activated, a sales order can also be saved with an invalid sales tax identification number.

A number greater than 0 can be used to control when a partner with a sales tax identification number in the sales order should be checked again using the Number of days between check field.

Germany grouping

In addition, under the Germany grouping the Request for an official confirmation notice can be made for the qualified confirmation. The confirmation notices are sent to the registered address of the German Vat ID of the home (requesting) organization.

Austria grouping

When checking the VAT ID for Austria, the transmitter must be a FinanzOnline participant. The participant must create a user for web services in the user administration, the web service must be used with this user. With the grouping Austria enter the identification of the participant for the FinanzOnline AT web service. In addition, the identification of the user who is allowed to use the web service is required, as well as a PIN to call up the test.

Partners

The partner’s VAT identification number to be checked must be entered in the Partner application on the Financial accounting data tab in the Accounting view. With the confirmation request for a sales tax identification number via the online interface, both the contents of the VAT ID field and the contents of the Additional VAT ID field can be checked.

In addition, your own organization must have a German or Austrian VAT identification number, which must also be entered in the Partner application on the Financial accounting data tab in the Accounting view.

Applications

If you activate the Vat ID confirmation function in the Customizing application, there are applications available for performing online validations of foreign Vat IDs, viewing the results of the validations and deleting obsolete Vat IDs.

Partner Vat ID online validation

With the Partner Vat ID online validation batch application that is integrated in the Financials menu, you can have the Vat IDs of your partners confirmed online. When the batch application is called up, a dialog window opens in which the partners and the confirmation method should be specified, and the request for an official confirmation notice can be made, if any.

The fields in detail:

• Organization – the organization currently loaded at the time of the call-up is predefined here. The Vat IDs for the partners of this organization are validated. This requires the organization to have a German or Austrian Vat ID entered in the partner master.
• Interface – pre-populated with the entry from the Vat ID Confirmation function in the Customizing application. It specifies the interface to be used for online validation of Vat IDs.
• Partners – enter one or more partner numbers whose Vat IDs are to be validated and confirmed. Use the Search for partners assistant to display and select partners for Vat ID confirmation.
• Confirmation method – select the confirmation method for online validation of foreign Vat IDs. Possible settings include:
  • Simple confirmation – checks only the current validity of a Vat ID.
  • Qualified confirmation – verifies the Vat ID and compares the provided information about the company’s name (including legal form), registered office, postal code, and street are compared against registered data. In addition, official confirmation notice can be requested
• Request for an official confirmation notice – here, you can specify whether an official confirmation notice should be requested. This is possible only for a qualified confirmation request. The confirmation notices are sent to the registered address of the German VAT ID of the own (requesting) organization.
  Check domestic VAT ID – as a rule, only the foreign sales tax identification numbers are checked. If you activate this field, the domestic sales tax identification numbers will also be checked.
  
  Note

  This function is currently not supported by the Federal Central Tax Office (BZSt).
  
  Check – you can use this field to control which sales tax identification numbers of the selected partners are to be checked. The following selections are available:
• Force check – with this selection, the sales tax identification numbers of the specified partners are checked regardless of their check status.
• Check unchecked – all partners are selected for whose sales tax identification number no test result has yet been saved. It is sufficient if the partner’s VAT identification number is unchecked. With this selection, new partners or newly created sales tax identification numbers can be checked automatically.
• Check faulty ones – selects all partners and sales tax identification numbers whose last check result was incorrect and whose change date for the partner master is later than the last check date (day + time). With this selection, corrected partner data can be checked again automatically.
• Check unconfirmed – only the partners whose VAT number has not yet been verified will be checked.
• Order after last check – with this selection, an ongoing check of the actually active business partners can be carried out. For this purpose, the partners are selected for testing:
  • The customers whose last sales order is younger than the last check carried out.
  • The suppliers are and whose last procurement order is n younger than the last check carried out.
  • n is a parameterizable number of days that you specify in the Customizing application in the Confirmation of VAT ID function via the Days since last order field.
• Participant identification – when checking via the BMF interface, enter the identification of the participant for the FinanzOnline AT web service in this field.
• User identification – when checking via the BMF interface, enter the identification of the user who is allowed to use the web service in this field.
• PIN – when testing via the BMF interface, enter the PIN for calling up the test here.

With the [In batch] button, a batch job is generated that creates the confirmation query in the form of individual queries per Vat ID and forwards them to the interface. The Vat IDs of the home organization and those of the specified partners from the Partners application are submitted for validation. If a qualified confirmation is required, the company’ s name, including the legal form, the registered office, the postal code and the street, are transferred from the partner master data additionally for every specified partner.

The results of this confirmation query are saved individually and contain, for every validated Vat ID, the queried data as well as the date, time and the return code of the query, through which the result of the validation will be represented.

If the return code receives the 203 or 204 values for a validated Vat ID, the transferred information includes the date on which the Vat ID is or was valid. If the return code is 204, the date will be also returned until which the Vat ID was valid.

For possible return codes of BZSt and their meaning, refer to the following table:

In addition, the respective response code for the comparison of the company’s name (including legal form), the registered office, the postal code and the street is also always transferred, even when these parameters have not been queried. In this case, the C response code (not queried) is returned. The following table shows the possible response codes and their meaning:

As far as the request for an official confirmation notice was made, it is to be mailed to the registered address of the German Vat ID of the own (requesting) organization.

You can have the results of the confirmation queries displayed in the Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result application.

Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result

The Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result application is used for presenting all or individual results from validation or confirmation queries for foreign Vat IDs. Here, you can find out whether the Vat ID of a partner is valid and whether, for example, the provided location, the name or the street match. In addition, entries can be removed from the display or deleted with the Delete button.

For a detailed description of the Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result application, refer to the Cockpit: Vat ID Confirmation Result article.

Delete obsolete Vat IDs

With the Delete obsolete Vat IDs batch application, you can delete obsolete Vat IDs via the BZSt-XML-RPC online interface. This can be required, for example, when a Vat ID is no longer up-to-date due to a spelling correction and revalidation.

When the batch application is called up from the Financials menu, the dialog window opens in which the partners are to be specified, whose obsolete Vat IDs should be deleted. The deletion process applies to the entries that are shown as the result of the validation or confirmation queries in the Cockpit: Vat ID confirmation result application.

If you activate the Only invalid Vat IDs label, only those entries will be deleted, the Vat IDs of which are obsolete and have been recognized as invalid based on the validation. Otherwise, all entries will be deleted, the Vat IDs of which do not match the current Vat IDs of the respective partner.