1. SAP Solution Brief
Solution Extensions
SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance by Crossgate
SAP® E-Invoicing for Compliance Accelerates
Transactions with Business Partners
Quick Facts
Summary Key Features Business Benefits
The SAP® E-Invoicing for Compliance appli- • Automated posting – Reduce time • Reduced cost of invoice processes
cation by Crossgate does more for your lag associated with posting paper bills, by increasing the level of automation
business than just convert paper to elec- eliminate errors related to rekeying • Higher compliance and legal certainty
tronic invoice formats. It enables you to information, and gain full transparency of by applying country-specific rules
send and receive legally compliant, digitally where the invoice is in the transmission • Improved connections to key business
signed invoices electronically in the format process partners by accelerated exchange
you or your business partners require. • Transaction checks – Run logical and of accurate, trusted information
Besides connecting you with your partners, business checks for every transaction • Lower cost through standardized
it facilitates compliance and accelerates to determine legal requirements for interfaces to the SAP ERP application
the receivables and payables cycles. format, authenticity, and integrity in and SAP Invoice Management application
compliance with the highest available by OpenText
Business Challenges standards
• Satisfy customer mandates concerning For More Information
electronic billing while fulfilling country- Contact your SAP representative today, or
specific tax requirements visit us online at www.sap.com/solutions
• Provide a universal view of invoices and /solutionextensions.
the cash situation for the accounting and
purchasing departments to tap cash
discounts and lower cost per invoice
• Accelerate onboarding processes
for trading partner participation and
increase return on investment from
business-to-business initiatives

2. Finance and IT executives are keen to adopt e-billing and InSIDE SAP® E-InvoICInG for ComPlIAnCE
By CroSSGATE
e-invoicing. With invoicing volumes increasing as part of business
consolidation and shared-service-center implementations, it is a The engine of the SAP® E-Invoicing for Compliance
application by Crossgate integrates directly with
sound strategy. CEOs also realize there is a competitive advantage your back-end SAP software, translating the docu-
in connecting electronically with global suppliers, customers, and ments you create into a universal metaformat and
then into the appropriate trading partner format.
logistics service providers. The SAP® E-Invoicing for Compliance To do this, the engine leverages prebuilt partner
application by Crossgate helps get partners on board cost-effectively profiles representing the business logic, formats,
and protocols of specific trading partners for
and to everyone’s advantage. e-invoicing and combines those with the relevant
compliance rules. The engine routes data for digital
signature creation and verification and forwards all
data to downstream systems for further processing
To avoid postal delays and meet sustainabil- send and receive paperless invoices with
for both inbound and outbound invoices. This allows
ity goals, customers have issued mandates any trading partner – regardless of com- you and your business partners to benefit from the
for electronic billing. However, a multitude pliance requirements and data standards. highest standards of integrity and authenticity
of different formats are in use, and each It simplifies the process of adopting evidence.
customer has country-specific tax require- e-invoicing and reduces the cost of getting
ments to meet. Even so, suppliers see the business partners on board. Because it
trend of e-invoicing as advantageous: No supports compliance with complex tax and DIrECT ACCESS To GloBAl PArTnEr
more lost paper invoices. No more late pay- other country-specific legal requirements, nETwork
ments delaying cash flow and undermin- you can reduce headcount reserved for
SAP has worked with third parties to build a world-
ing relationships with business partners. compliance checks while increasing auto- class partner network for business-to-business
A universal view of invoices from all depart- mation. Using the software, you can send trading that includes hubs that can help you quickly
ments allowing the finance team to tap and receive electronic invoices to your trad- extend the reach of your electronic invoices. Simpli-
all cash discounts. Lower costs per invoice ing partners and conform to their chang- fied onboarding and profile creation means you
can accelerate adoption by your customers and
– much lower costs in the entire payables ing data standards and country-specific
suppliers and increase your percentage of elec-
and receivables process. Recent analyst tax and legal regulations. The software lets tronically sent and received invoices.
reports stated that the average processing you take advantage of economies of scale
cost of a paper invoice could be reduced and volume processing to drive efficiency business partners that enable straight-
by up to 80% through e-invoicing. throughout your financial operations. It through processing, allowing you to rede-
Yet e-invoicing is getting a slow start. The helps you improve your performance on ploy valuable resources to more strategic
complex maze of regulatory requirements key metrics like days sales outstanding activities. The software improves efficiency
and lack of standard software and integra- and capture payment discounts offered in administrative processes and decreases
tion frameworks has held up adoption of for early remittance. error rates, which results in better relation-
this e-trend. In addition, traditional trading ships with your business partners. Adopt-
partner integration for invoices has been STATe-oF-THe-ART DeLIveRy ing an e-invoicing strategy can also serve as
complex, time consuming, and costly. PLATFoRM a key element in your company’s financial
shared-services approach.
ConneCTIng wITH BuSIneSS SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance builds on
PARTneRS eLeCTRonICALLy a robust architecture that enables you to ConFIDenT CoMPLIAnCe
leverage economies of scale. The software
SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance resolves allows for direct electronic data interchange Trading partners often require specific
these difficulties, letting you economically (EDI) connections to your high-volume e-commerce formats, such as extensible

3. markup language (XML) or Electronic Data connection for true straight-through pro- to SAP Invoice Management and stored
Interchange for Administration Commerce cessing. The open and scalable approach in your archive system of choice.
and Transport (EDIFACT). Government to onboarding encourages the participa- Freed up from manual tasks like scanning
and tax authorities have their own set of tion of your trading partners, who can move invoices and rekeying data, your procure-
legal and archiving requirements and may gradually to 100% participation in your ment professionals gain time to perform
even specify the document format required business-to-business initiatives. Everyone value-adding activities like maintaining
for legally binding original documents. saves costs due to reduced postage, han- supplier relationships and leveraging pay-
Meanwhile, the more business-to-business dling, and days sales outstanding repre- ment discounts. The comprehensive report-
connections you have to build and main- sented by the lag between dispatch and ing and audit trail functionality of your SAP
tain, the more expensive it gets. Establish- receipt. In addition, companies acquire applications gives staff useful tools to per-
ing a single connection may entail hun- welcome support in meeting their carbon form efficient searches, facilitates compli-
dreds of mappings to fully accommodate emissions goals through reduced use of ance, and helps them manage and store
your trading partner network, and this paper, printers, and toner. the electronic documents.
doesn’t include the corresponding partner
change management requirements. SAP InCoMIng InvoICe MAnAgeMenT Key BeneFITS
E-Invoicing for Compliance handles these
tasks through a series of legal and compli- Your suppliers perform better when With SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance,
ance checks performed for each incoming they are paid promptly and in the right your business is ready to take the next step
and outgoing e-invoice. The software keeps amount. Despite your volume of business- toward paperless processing in your finan-
you up-to-date automatically on the require- to-business transactions, SAP E-invoicing cial operations. Whether inbound or out-
ments of over 38 countries. Updates in legal for Compliance helps you maintain accu- bound e-invoicing, whether operating in
checks and file structures are part of the racy, capture those early payment dis- a shared service environment or not, you
software’s standard maintenance. counts, and still achieve invoice processing benefit from:
cost reductions. The application works • Improved financial operation efficiency
ouTBounD InvoICe MAnAgeMenT with the SAP Invoice Management appli- • Improved relationships with trading
cation by OpenText, helping you leverage partners
Many companies see e-billing as a key existing investments and automate true • Lower compliance risk
method for decreasing the cost of finan- straight-through processing. Errors are
cial operations. But getting customers on systematically excluded from the process
board can make the conversion to e-billing as SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance checks
complicated. SAP E-Invoicing for Compli- the PDF invoice, the structured data, the
ance solves that problem by allowing your digital signature file, and the receiver infor-
trading partners to get on board in stages. mation for correctness. These documents
Your customers can first receive a digitally – including the verification protocol – are
signed PDF and from there move to an EDI transferred to the SAP ERP application or
SAP E-Invoicing for Compliance lets you economically
send and receive paperless invoices with any trading
partner – regardless of compliance requirements and
data standards.

4. www.sap.com/contactsap
50 106 367 (11/08) ©2011 SAP AG. All rights reserved.
SAP, R/3, SAP NetWeaver, Duet, PartnerEdge, ByDesign,
SAP BusinessObjects Explorer, StreamWork, SAP HANA, and other SAP
products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos
are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and other
countries.
Business Objects and the Business Objects logo, BusinessObjects,
Crystal Reports, Crystal Decisions, Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, and other
Business Objects products and services mentioned herein as well as their
respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Business
Objects Software Ltd. Business Objects is an SAP company.
Sybase and Adaptive Server, iAnywhere, Sybase 365, SQL Anywhere, and
other Sybase products and services mentioned herein as well as their
respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sybase, Inc.
Sybase is an SAP company.
All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of
their respective companies. Data contained in this document serves
informational purposes only. National product specifications may vary.
These materials are subject to change without notice. These materials
are provided by SAP AG and its affiliated companies (“SAP Group”)
for informational purposes only, without representation or warranty of
any kind, and SAP Group shall not be liable for errors or omissions with
respect to the materials. The only warranties for SAP Group products and
services are those that are set forth in the express warranty statements
accompanying such products and services, if any. Nothing herein should
be construed as constituting an additional warranty.