Since January 1, 2018, the French financial law n° 2017-1837 has obliged French eCommerce websites to use an extension that meets the requirements of inalterability, security, preservation and archiving of data for control of the French tax administration.
This new law is used to cope with VAT fraud and applied to all Cash Software which can be translated to English.
Is my VirtueMart website a "Cash Software"?
When your eCommerce website uses VirtueMart to take the money (payments) and VirtueMart creates the invoice, then VirtueMart is a cash software. Find more information about the exact definition and text law references here.
Who are affected by the French financial law?
You are concerned by this law if:
- Your company is French,
- Your company is subjected to VAT and is not covered by the VAT exemption scheme, or carry out exclusively exempt transactions,
- Your website use software - management, accounting or a cash register system - to record sales or service transactions. It means your website uses VirtueMart.
- Your company sells to individuals (B2C business model) except if you are an "auto-entrepreneur".
What should you do to react this law?
To comply to the french financial law, your eCommerce website must follow these conditions:
- Inalterable data: your extension must keep the data entered in its original state and record any modification operation,
- Security: your extension must secure the data and thus guarantee the return of transaction data in their original state,
- Retention: your extension must have closure-of-accounts exercise - at least annually - and data retention for 6 years. Your extension must also include a daily and monthly closure-of-accounts,
- Archiving: your extension must allow to archive and date the documents and to guarantee easy access to the tax administration. The french tax administration must be able to consult the data, in a tax file format.
Thanks for reading!