Digitizing invoice content requirements

Owned by Vesa Koskinen
Last updated: Mar 31, 2023
3 min read

From this page you can find technical requirements for digitizing invoices, ie. invoices that are send as PDF files via email or as paper invoices to the OpusCapita scanning service. Please note that in addition to the technical requirements, there are typically legal requirements that vary per country.

 

Guidelines for sending (non-structuded) PDF by Email

Email Invoice Digitizing enables your customers to receive invoices as email attachments. The following prerequisites are required from the sender for OpusCapita to process the invoices.

Please be aware that the domain is dedicated only for Invoice Digitizing services. Anyone who knows the correct email address can send email invoices. The email body text including sender and receiver information is added to the invoice and is attached to all invoices in the specific email message and processed. The Service uses spam filtering.

If the below requirements are not met and the invoice cannot be processed then it will be rejected.

  • The email address must be entered into recipient “TO” field in the email message. Multiple email addresses are not supported in “TO”-field

  • The Sender of the email invoice should not use a “no-reply” since they will not receive possible error messages

  • Only PDF- or TIFF-file attachments are accepted.

    • Supported and required PDF formats: 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, 1.6, 1.7 and PDF/A-1, PDF/A-2, PDF/A-3

    • Supported and required TIFF formats: TIFF CCITT 4 Fax B&W (300 dpi)

  • If an email contains other non-valid attachments (i.e. .docx) only PDF- and TIFF-file attachments will be processed and the rest of the attachments will be ignored

  • One attachment is one invoice. If one attachment includes several invoices, they are handled as one (the first one will be interpreted and verified)

  • If one invoice and its appendixes are in separate files, they are not handled as one invoice. The separate appendix is rejected

  • One email can include up to 10 attachments

  • Maximum size for one attachment is 10 Mb.

  • Maximum layout size for an attachment is A3 (no minimum size limitation).

  • Maximum page limit for one attachment (one invoice) is 500 pages.

  • PDF files cannot be encrypted or password protected

  • Fonts need to be included in the PDF if it contains text layouts

  • If the invoice is first printed out on paper and then scanned before it is attached and sent by email to OpusCapita:

    • The print quality should be, minimum 600 dpi

    • The color should be black-and-white

    • The chosen font should be easy to read, i.e. Arial

    • The scanning settings should be, minimum 300 dpi

  • The email shall follow standard protocols MIME 1.0/1.1 with RFC 5322, 2231 and 2045

 

Guidelines for sending structured PDF by Email

Following requirements needs to be fulfilled to process’ the invoice(s) and must therefore be followed by the email invoice sender.

If the below requirements are not met and the invoice cannot be processed then it will be rejected.

 

  • The email address must be entered in recipient “TO” field in the email message and multiple email addresses are not supported in “TO”-field

  • The email shall follow standard protocols Java based encoding, MIME 1.0/1.1 with RFC 5322, 2231 and 2045.

  • Only PDF attachments are accepted, supported and required PDF formats: 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, 1.6, 1.7 and PDF/A-1, PDF/A-2, PDF/A-3

  • If an email also contains other non-valid attachments (i.e.docx) only PDF attachment will be processed and rest of the attachment(s) will be ignored without any acknowledge to the sender

  • If email contains only non-valid attachments, sender gets notification of missing valid attachments.

  • One attachment is one invoice. If one attachment includes several invoices, they are handled as one, the first one will be interpreted and verified

  • One attachment must contain both invoice and it’s appendix(s). If one invoice and its appendixes are in separate files, they are not handled as one invoice. The separate appendix is rejected

  • One email can include up to 10 attachments

  • Maximum size for one attachment or one email in total is 10 MB.

  • Maximum layout size for an attachment is A3 (no minimum size limitation)

  • PDF files cannot be encrypted or password protected

  • Fonts need to be included in the PDF if it contains text layouts