FAQ: OpusCapita PEPPOL

What is Peppol Network?

PEPPOL, which stands for Pan-European Public Procurement Online, is the guideline for eProcurement created by the European Union and 18 government agencies. In other words, PEPPOL is a body of specifications that enable European businesses to easily deal electronically with any European public sector buyer in their procurement process. iPEPPOL in practice is a protocol that allows public entities and their suppliers to exchange electronic procurement documents over its network. With PEPPOL documents for e-ordering, e-invoicing, electronic credit notes and advanced shipping notifications (ASNs) can be exchanged. These technologies automate information exchange across the supply chain, reducing the cost and potential risk of error from manual intervention.

How does Peppol work?

Connecting to PEPPOL takes place using Access Points (operated by Access Point providers,such as OpusCapita and others) Think of PEPPOL in the same way you think of emails: in order to send and receive emails one needs to have internet and mail server access. And in order to be able to run procurement electronically with a public entity you need to have access to the PEPPOL network.

How does Peppol Access Point work?

The basic operations of an Access Point are:

1. The sender of an electronic document (for example an eInvoice, an eOrder or an eCatalogue) sends the document to a PEPPOL Access Point using mechanisms agreed with their access point provider. 2. The access point identifies the service required (and may validate the type of document being sent) and also identifies the access point for the recipient. 3. The access point delivers the document to the recipient's access point. 4. And this access point in turn delivers the document to the recipient.

For OpusCapita customers PEPPOL is alread enabled in their existing services (E-invoice sending, E- invoice receiving, B2B integration) and they can use the OpusCapita Access Point to exchange documents with business partners using other access point providers.

Which business documents does OpusCapita support via the Peppol network?

PEPPOL divides its business process into pre-and post-award sets. Access points need to support one or more of the PEPPOL post-award business processes (pre-award processes are optional).

These processes are specified in documents called Business Interoperability Specifications (BISs). OpusCapita supports following documents:

● PEPPOL BIS 1A Catalogue Only ● PEPPOL BIS 3A Order Only ● PEPPOL BIS 4A Invoice ● PEPPOL BIS 5A Billing ● PEPPOL BIS 28A Ordering ● PEPPOL BIS 30A Despatch Advice ● PEPPOL BIS 36A Message Level Response

Is the OpusCapita Access Point certified?

Yes, OpusCapita has a certified access point both in outbound and inbound document flows.

How are companies identified in Peppol? PEPPOL receivers and senders are identified using a combination of an ISO6523 identifier and the corresponding identifier value. For Finnish organizations the syntax of a SenderId and ReceiverId looks like this: 0037:12345678. So it is different compared to E-invoice ID used locally in Finland, which would be 003712345678.

If your company receives documents, for example invoices through Peppol, you have to inform your Supplier about the correct identifier (e.g. 0037:12345678). And if you are sending documents through Peppol you have to know your business partner’s Peppol identification and add your own identifier to your business document.

Can I exchange Peppol documents internationally? Yes. The OpusCapita Access Point (AP) is international and can deliver our documents to different countries, wherever your business partner is. The only condition is however, that your business partner needs to also be connected to a Peppol AP as receiving company. And of course you need to know his/her Peppol identification number. Peppol identification numbers in different countries are different, similarly to organization ID’s, VAT numbers and Public sector ID’s. Luckily, you just need to know your business partner’s ID in Peppol, OpusCapita will take care of the rest.

How to use Peppol? In order to use Peppol, you need to contact your access point provider (for our customers, that’s us). If you are already using our eInvoice service then activating PEPPOL is very easy.

What do my customers and suppliers need to know about PEPPOL services? Your customers and suppliers should be aware that your PEPPOL Access Point exists and supports their business processes and that this allows them to access or provide eProcurement across Europe. You should also ask if those business partners have certified access points and what business document types they are supporting.

Will my customers need new software to use PEPPOL?

Your suppliers and customers will have to adapt their internal business processes and related systems to support PEPPOL’s data flows. OpusCapita is more than happy to help also your business partners to integrate with the Peppol Network.

In which countries is Peppol currently available?

Currently the coverage in European countries is increasing heavily and just recently Poland announced that they will start using Peppol for eProcurement in the public sector. Also several access points are operating globally and they can channel the business documents regardless where the supplier or buyer has their operations.

The public sector has started using PEPPOL in the following countries:

• • • – DIGST • Netherlands – SimplerInvoicing • UK/Healthcare – NHS • – Fedict • Finland •