Why choose Integra for e-invoicing?
In the November 2025 Budget, the UK Government confirmed its plans to introduce a mandatory e-invoicing requirement for B2B (Business to Business) and B2G (Business to Government) for all VAT invoices from April 2029, part of a wider move to modernise tax administration. The intention behind this policy is to improve tax compliance (that is, reduce VAT fraud) and just as importantly promote prompt payment, also a key deliverable of Integra Invoice Processing.
This mandate followed the publication of the government’s consultation response and set the stage for a three-year programme of technical, policy and stakeholder engagement throughout 2026 and beyond.
We were honoured to be invited to join the HMRC’s new Technical Development Working Group with the Department of Trade to help shape:
the practical design of the UK e-invoicing framework
the technical standards to be adopted
interoperability requirements
the forthcoming e-invoicing Implementation Roadmap
Integra IDP is the version of Instream that has been especially integrated with our public sector finance software for Integra customers. Instream has a global reputation, which began in 2004, for expertly delivering Intelligent Document Processing to large enterprise world-wide for Account Payable and a wide range of other use-cases. The UK public sector is no stranger to e-invoicing. From 2019, the NHS required its organisations to be PEPPOL-enabled to receive e-invoices, alongside a national push for suppliers to submit invoices electronically via the PEPPOL network.
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Return on Investment Model
Value for Money calculations for a Public Sector organisation adopting Integra IDP for intelligent invoice automation coming from relatively efficient manual invoice processes.
Cash | Capacity | Source | |
Average per invoice | £6 | 10 mins | Model Hospital Anonymous, Ardent Partners 2025, HM Gov (£6-12) |
Saving over term | £760,000 - £920,000 | 360,000 mins | Integra IDP (Instream): Manual processing costs less IDP savings less IDP costs. Savings in 'touch' time. Control figures: HM Gov various |
Capacity release | 8,000 hrs | ||
Cash savings per £1 outlay | £8-10 | ||
Capacity release per £1 outlay | 14 mins |
60,000 invoices processed annually, calculated over a 3-year term
many manual processes have a per invoice cost nearer to £12 per invoice
the ‘touch time’ associated with invoice automation varies based on supplier management standards, in particular “no PO, no pay” where supplier non-compliance can introduce the need for a human to resolve queries.
FAQs
See AllIn the UK, as of 2029 all VAT invoices must be issued and received electronically via public networks such as Peppol and DBNAllance. This means that your organisation will almost certainly need to have a PEPPOL-compliant invoice processing capability. In this context the Integra IDP Platform provides the necessary infrastructure for the secure and reliable receipt of invoices from Peppol and the transmission of Purchase Orders via Peppol.
Your suppliers will be issuing e-invoices because most will include VAT. This means that your invoice-processing system will need to support e-invoicing in line with the mandate.
Just now the 2029 mandate is focussed solely around invoices. However, experience from other European countries suggests that the e-invoicing process is likely to extend to cover the whole Procure-to-Pay (P2P) process. The PEPPOL network supports Electronic Purchase Orders (ePOs), Electronic Order Acknowledgements, Electronic Delivery Notes, Electronic Invoices and Electronic Remittance Advice so it is reasonable to assume that this will be direction of travel.
Interestingly, the NHS is already ahead of the curve here. NHS Supply Chain and some Trusts already use Peppol-based networks for electronic POs as well as invoices — so the infrastructure for broader P2P transmission already exists in parts of the public sector.
The first and most important point is that inSTREAM is the embedded AI driven IDP engine in the Integra Finance Suite. Integra is designed to meet the challenges of Public Sector bodies and this includes Intelligent Invoice Automation. Our solution supports a variety of e-invoicing networks including PEPPOL which is likely to be mandated by the UK authorities. Integra IDP securely handles all the message transfers by seamlessly managing the PEPPOL network end-point for your organisation. The beauty is that the platform will apply the same rules of enrichment and validation in relation to your Integra supplier lists, IBAN numbers etc., complete the same fraud detection tasks and will route invoices according to your business process. Very neatly, it will also turn the e-invoice data into a human-readable PDF so that your finance team can visualise the invoice and compare to the extracted data.
This is an interesting area. By inference, if there is no VAT involved in the transaction, the mandate doesn’t apply. So in the case of inter-NHS recharges or Core Clinical Services, there is no VAT and therefore the mandate doesn’t apply. However, invoices for e.g. car parking, private clinical services, private research, catering, property rental etc. do have VAT implications and are therefore covered. In other words, it is highly likely that you will generate VAT invoices and therefore your finance system will need to support e-invoicing.
That’s simple! Keep talking to our e-invoicing specialists. Our team can help you plan your readiness and make all the technical connections and process changes happen for you. Remember, your paper and email invoicing can co-exist in the same instance so you can manage early adopters as well as laggards and exempt organisations without disruption. Crucially, all documents can be subject to the same scrutiny by the our intelligent invoice automaton platform so risk is minimised.
Furthermore, it is worth remembering that our e-invoicing team are part of the HMRC Technical Development Workgroup and we run webinars and workshops in association with the Integra User Group to keep our customers up to speed with developments.
