INTHEBLACK February 2023 - Magazine - Page 44
F E AT U R E
AT A GLANCE
Many Australian businesses
still invoice manually, despite
e-invoicing having been
available in Australia for years.
Australia adopted the
Peppol framework as the
common e-invoicing
standard in 2019.
The Australian Taxation Office
works with the states and
territories to expand the use
of e-invoicing.
Why Australian businesses
need to adopt e-invoicing
Thanks to digital technology, e-invoicing is widely available in Australia.
So, why do many businesses still invoice manually?
Story Gary Anders
More than 1.2 billion invoices are generated
and exchanged in Australia every year,
according to Federal Treasury estimates.
That averages out to about 3.3 million
invoices being exchanged every day of the year.
If that sounds like a mountain of
paperwork, it is. This is because a high
percentage of invoices in Australia are still
being prepared manually – that is, on paper
or PDF – and then printed and posted or
emailed for payment.
That is something suppliers need not be
doing anymore, thanks to advances in
digital technology. In fact, e-invoicing – short
for electronic invoicing – has been widely
available in Australia for some time.
E-invoicing is the automated digital
exchange of invoice information between
the supplier and the buyer, using secure
business-to-business networks – such as those
readily available through accounting software
providers. It can eliminate the need for
sellers to create invoices manually and for
buyers to scan or key invoices into their
computer software.
44 INTHEBLACK February 2023
According to the Australian Taxation Office
(ATO), the materials and processing costs
involved with creating every paper-based or PDF
invoice are between A$27 and A$30 per invoice.
By contrast, the ATO estimates that process
automation via e-invoicing typically reduces
costs to less than A$10 per invoice.
GOVERNMENT TAKES THE LEAD
In 2019, Australia adopted the international
eProcurement Peppol framework as the
common e-invoicing standard.
Peppol’s use is governed by a multi-lateral
agreement structure that has been widely
adopted by governments around the world.
As part of the Digital Economy Strategy,
the former Morrison government allocated
more than A$15 million in the 2021-2022
federal budget to enhance the value of
e-invoicing for businesses and accelerate
its adoption.
Early work involved working with payment
providers (including EFTPOS, Visa,
Mastercard and New Payments Platform
Australia) to integrate e-invoicing into the