Illegal invoice changes

[ju5t]

I'm confused.

WHMCS has successfully implemented GDPR in time before the deadline but it still makes illegal changes to invoices after they have gone out to a customer.

In 7.5 they have added another feature that does this. The domain redemption feature makes sense in a lot of ways. It should never remove the domain from an invoice when it expired though. I always get the idea that such features aren't given enough thought. This is the second time in under 6 months that a new feature causes problems. I'm really disappointed by this.

It would be great if WHMCS would keep EU laws and regulations in mind when developing new features. For example, this means you can never, ever change an invoice after it has been sent.

[Remitur]

Why "illegal"?

Unpaid invoices are to be considered as "pro forma invoices", which is to say that they're no fiscal documents.

You need to set up your WHMCS in order to give them different sequence number when they're paid, and begin to call then "invoices", and not "pro forma"... 

[ju5t]

Unpaid invoices aren't considered proforma invoices in the EU by default. An invoice sent via e-mail is a fiscal document and gives you a legal ground to chase a payment, proforma invoices don't. 

Also, as VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied, not when an invoice is paid, it makes sense to use invoices for companies in the EU. The fact that WHMCS gives both options doesn't change the fact that it is illegal to remove or adjust invoices after they have been sent. 

It's illegal to change invoices because you are required to have a reliable audit trail. WHMCS just deletes information from an invoice. It doesn't make a credit note, it doesn't log the change, it's just gone. 

https://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/sites/taxation/files/resources/documents/taxation/vat/traders/invoicing_rules/explanatory_notes_en.pdf
https://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/business/vat/eu-vat-rules-topic/chargeable-event-chargeability_en

[Remitur]

11 hours ago, ju5t said:

Unpaid invoices aren't considered proforma invoices in the EU by default.

Proforma invoices are proforma invoices, which is different from "unpaid invoices".

If you issue (unpaid) invoices, they're fully fiscal documents.

If you name them "proforma invoices", they're not invoices.

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An invoice sent via e-mail is a fiscal document and gives you a legal ground to chase a payment, proforma invoices don't. 

This depends: it's your national law which decides it, not european directives.

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Also, as VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied, not when an invoice is paid,

I don't supply the service until the proforma is paid, so not VAT is chargeable.

So, i.e.:

1. customer order a domain registration
2. I issue a proforma
3. customer pays the proforma 10 days later
4. I register the domain and issue the invoice about his payment

Otherwise, what happen if a customer doesn't pay?

1. customer order a domain registration
2. you issue a full invoice
3. customer doesn't pay the invoice
4. you need later to issue a credit note to cancel the invoice you issued

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 The fact that WHMCS gives both options doesn't change the fact that it is illegal to remove or adjust invoices after they have been sent. 

Again: on a PROFORMA invoice you can do it.

BTW: proforma invoice exists in european countries too. It's widely used in international trading, and import/export, mainly for custom purposes (https://www.dhl.ie/en/express/customs_support/customs_paperwork/proforma_invoice.html ), but also for internal commerce too ( http://www.teamsystem.com/store/2017/05/08/fattura-proforma-cos-e-perche-utilizzarla/ )

If you don't like the "proforma invoice" name, you can change it to "order proposal"... nothing change.

The only mandatory aspect is that you are required not to supply the service before the payment.

 

[Remitur]

see also this link: http://www.sandrasilk.co.uk/article/88/Why-issue-a-proforma-invoice/

[ju5t]

1 minute ago, Remitur said:

Proforma invoices are proforma invoices, which is different from "unpaid invoices".

If you issue (unpaid) invoices, they're fully fiscal documents.

If you name them "proforma invoices", they're not invoices.

This is not what you initially wrote down. You said that unpaid invoices are to be considered proforma and that's not true. I know the difference between the two, that's not why I'm pointing it out. WHMCS supports both invoices as well as proforma invoices. Their implementation of invoices is wrong. Even if you would use proforma invoices WHMCS allows you to change an invoice after it has been paid, this should stop.

Either way, this entire question is not about what alternatives are out there, it's about the fact that we're using invoices (and not proforma invoices) and we don't want to change that. Our customers wouldn't understand. Proforma isn't common in a lot of European countries, definitely not in ours, when it comes to B2C.

7 minutes ago, Remitur said:

Otherwise, what happen if a customer doesn't pay?

1. customer order a domain registration
2. you issue a full invoice
3. customer doesn't pay the invoice
4. you need later to issue a credit note to cancel the invoice you issued

Yes. Exactly that. This is an edge case for us, it rarely happens, so we choose to send out invoices immediately.

You pick out one example, but what about renewals? If you renew a service you are already providing the service and VAT is due. Do you immediately suspend the service when payment is due? We don't. We chase our customers if they don't pay.

I know proforma is widely used for custom purposes but it's not very common in B2C transactions. Even in B2B it's not used often, at least not by the companies we work with.

Again though, we don't want to use proforma invoices, it's not a solution, it's a workaround.

[Remitur]

On 6/6/2018 at 10:04 AM, ju5t said:

I know proforma is widely used for custom purposes but it's not very common in B2C transactions. Even in B2B it's not used often, at least not by the companies we work with.

Call them "order proposal/confirmation" instead of "proforma invoice", and everything go fine... ;-)

About your habit of using "full" invoices in B2C, I have a question: are you issuing invoices to consumer, before their payment? 

Number of given-up services in consumer market is quite high, I think it's only a way to make everything more difficult, with a lot of credit note to be issued to users who did not renewed...

And ... what happen if a user yours pays lately? The domain went in redemption mode, and the customer paid only a percentage of your cost to recover and renew it... 

[ju5t]

I'm not entirely sure what you're after. My question is not about how to run your business it's about WHMCS offering an option that hasn't been properly implemented.

You seem to be looking for answers on how we decide to run our business and you're hinting that we should change that, but that's not what we want. Regardless of how you run your business, WHMCS allows you to make changes to invoices (in your case, for paid services) and that's illegal. It doesn't matter if you use proforma or not, once it becomes an invoice it shouldn't be possible to change it. It really is that simple.

Again, we don't want to use proforma invoices, not now, not in the future. We want to be able to send standard invoices, as is currently possible already, and it should not be possible to change them, ever.

[Remitur]

21 hours ago, ju5t said:

 My question is not about how to run your business it's about WHMCS offering an option that hasn't been properly implemented.

... or maybe it's you, who are using it in the wrong way...

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You seem to be looking for answers on how we decide to run our business and you're hinting that we should change that, but that's not what we want.

A piece of software is a piece of software.

Or you find a way to adapt it to your own business, or it will not work.

Quote

Regardless of how you run your business, WHMCS allows you to make changes to invoices (in your case, for paid services) and that's illegal.

I have a car who can run up to 170 Km/h. Maybe even more.
But in my own country maximum allowed speed is 130 Km/h.
Does this make my car "illegal"? Obviously not... it's as I usr/drive it which make the difference between "lawful" and "unlawful".

Quote

It doesn't matter if you use proforma or not, once it becomes an invoice it shouldn't be possible to change it. It really is that simple.

So also about any billing and accounting software: almost every billing software will allow you, somehow, to correct/delete/rewrite a yet issued invoice.
It's your own choice to do it or not.
(There're other softwares, which archive fiscal documents in a secure and impossible to modify way... but this include digital signatures and other tricks, which are very far from WHMCS's goals) 

 

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Again, we don't want to use proforma invoices, not now, not in the future. We want to be able to send standard invoices, as is currently possible already, and it should not be possible to change them, ever.

WHMCS is a quite good software, which is used right now in Europe at least by few hundreds of companies, I guess.

And, as my own company, all of them are using it in a way which is respectful of current local laws.

To do it we need to properly configure WHMCS and also (why not?) also adapt our business model to WHMCS.

If you don't want to do so, you have only two other options:

• look for another billing software which fits to your needs
• write your own billing software

Good luck!

By the way: I asked about how you manage your business not because I'm curious or I want to persuade you to change it or whatsoever: I asked just to understand if there's a way to adapt and configure WHMCS to fit it. So, ultimately, I asked it to help you.
But if you're firmly convinced that you're right and WHMCS (and its community) are wrong, sorry, but I can't help you.
 

Again, good luck! 

[ju5t]

2 minutes ago, Remitur said:

Does this make my car "illegal"? Obviously not... it's as I usr/drive it which make the difference between "lawful" and "unlawful".

In this case though, WHMCS is changing an invoice after it has been sent. If you take this to your comparison; it's a self-driving car that forces you to drive 170km/h, and although I doubt there are case laws about this yet, I assume the car manufacturer would be the one to change this (if you can't, and in the case of WHMCS, you have no choice). 

And I know you can change invoice records one way or another, that's besides the point, WHMCS shouldn't do it by itself.

6 minutes ago, Remitur said:

Or you find a way to adapt it to your own business, or it will not work.

This isn't a binary discussion, it's not a case of true or false, I was merely making a suggestion which you seem to be taking as an offence. If that's the case I'm sorry, but that wasn't my intention. 

9 minutes ago, Remitur said:

To do it we need to properly configure WHMCS and also (why not?) also adapt our business model to WHMCS.

I don't agree. I'm giving feedback on a process that I think should be changed. You have solved it by changing your business process to proforma invoices which is great, as it helps your company, but we have another opinion.

You don't seem to see this as feedback but as an attack on WHMCS (or yourself), it isn't. I just want a solution for a problem we've had in the last 8 years. Until now we've been able to work around it by developing custom add-ons that prevent certain situations from happening, but WHMCS keeps on adding features that are able to change invoices automatically. I don't think this is right as EU legislation is very clear about this.

17 minutes ago, Remitur said:

So also about any billing and accounting software: almost every billing software will allow you, somehow, to correct/delete/rewrite a yet issued invoice.
It's your own choice to do it or not.

As I pointed out before: the change is only illegal if there is no reliable audit trail. Our accounting software doesn't allow you to change invoices. If you do want to make a change it forces you to do so in a way that creates an audit trail. 

Of course there are always ways around it but as I started this reply, that's not the point. 

28 minutes ago, Remitur said:

But if you're firmly convinced that you're right and WHMCS (and its community) are wrong, sorry, but I can't help you.

We're not the only ones. It was raised over 4 years ago already: https://requests.whmcs.com/topic/prevent-invoices-from-being-changed. 

If you or anyone else has any EU laws or case laws that I'm not familiar with please share them, as again, this is feedback, it's not an attack. I'm more than happy to change my feedback if it turns out my understanding of EU legislation has been wrong.

[brian!]

On 6/10/2018 at 10:21, ju5t said:

I'm giving feedback on a process that I think should be changed.

not commenting on the legality of this topic one way or the other (i'm not an EU lawyer lol), but i'm unsure this thread is the appropriate route for "feedback", e.g will anyone at WHMCS, with significant influence enough to make the desired change, actually read it ? personally, I doubt that they will... the "official" advice tends to be to either post in the Feedback thread, or to submit a feature request (or in this case, add to the existing one you've already mentioned)... to be honest, i've got no faith in either route, but they'd have a better chance rather than a thread lost amongst other threads in "Installation, Upgrade, and Import Support" - especially as this topic doesn't really apply to installing, upgrading (in the strict sense) or importing.

On 6/10/2018 at 10:21, ju5t said:

We're not the only ones. It was raised over 4 years ago already: https://requests.whmcs.com/topic/prevent-invoices-from-being-changed. 

isn't it usually 5 years, on average, before a feature request gets completed by WHMCS?

[ody]

A Proforma Invoice it's common international commercial way to issue it for a service or product which do not creates you any VAT obligation, it might include-have VAT Cost but if this proforma never paid by your client do not creates you any VAT obligation (to inform your local TAX authorities and pay-transfer to them the VAT amount) and it's common among all EU countries.

So in this case WHMCS it's working fine for us and cover our needs because a proforma invoice it's not an official one EU commercial document.

It will be official only if it will be paid by the client and then you have the obligation to reverse it into a paid invoice and pay-transfer invoice VAT cost to the local TAX authorities in which you or your company landed.

WHMCS system-setup act also right in this case as when a client pay a proforma invoice system can auto reverse it in an official invoice which is the right way-order under EU rules.

 

If you issue an Unpaid Invoice,

this is a very sensitive case because if you change the WHMCS Title from Proforma to Unpaid or as simple Invoice, then you obligate to pay the VAT cost to your local authorities and there is no any relation if your client pay this invoice or not, an Unpaid Invoice it's an official EU Document and you have to pay the VAT to your local TAX authorities.

 

The only problem which we face with WHMCS it's that,

when a proforma invoice paid by a client and WHMCS change it into an official paid invoice, (the new official one), keeps the date in which the proforma issued

and this is a problem because if a proforma issued into lets say into April and client pay it into May this is big problem,

because as far we know into at least 2 EU countries in which we have offices these countries obligate us to give a monthly VAT report and pay on a monthly base the difference between VAT incomes-outcomes.

 

Hope all above it helps.

Edited July 11, 2018 by ody

[ju5t]

Wow, your font doesn't come out great on my screen. It's not easy on the eyes.

VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied, not when an invoice is paid. This is the case for every European country. I've referenced this article in a previous post but perhaps you've missed it: https://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/business/vat/eu-vat-rules-topic/chargeable-event-chargeability_en. A proforma invoice and not paying tax while you're providing a service is, unlike what you state in your post, not legal. You've provided a service that you should get paid for and therefore VAT is due. The current system of changing a proforma invoice into a fiscal document upon payment is not how it is dictated by European law.

Even if proforma invoices were the solution (for the record: they're definitely not), they're not common or used at all by B2C or B2B service providers in The Netherlands and would be confusing for most customers. For some it's easy to say that you should teach your customers differently but that's not how we approach or deal with them. We're here to make it easier.

The problem is the fact that WHMCS makes changes to invoices at its sole discretion. If a customer cancels a product on an unpaid invoice, this product is removed from the invoice, and that's not allowed. There are other cases too where WHMCS removes items from an invoice, resulting in customers either paying too little or too much. You could argue that proforma invoices can be used as a workaround but that would only be true if you haven't supplied the service yet. This essentially means you would have to suspend all services on the day the service is due for renewal. It's not the most customer friendly solution of all.

[ody]

Hello ju5t,

At first we are in business as a company (Group) more than 20 years and we had face almost all VAT issues etc.

Now as for

Quote

VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied, not when an invoice is paid.

Please try to understand, if your Title mention Proforma this is not creates you any VAT obligation or to inform your local TAX authorities but if your document mentioning Invoice, (paid or unpaid- it's not the case), this is an official TAX document and there is no any relation if you provide the service or if this invoice will be paid or not from your client and you are obligate to inform your local TAX for it.

I suggest you to ask your accountant for this so to clarify to you which is the difference between Proforma Invoice and Invoice

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The problem is the fact that WHMCS makes changes to invoices at its sole discretion. If a customer cancels a product on an unpaid invoice, this product is removed from the invoice, and that's not allowed.

Yes you are right with it, and we find out this lastly, this is a great issue-problem because not only EU and Local TAX-VAT rules do not allowed it but also creates you huge penalty cost and crime issues.

Also WHMCS have to solve this and learn that we in EU we don't have any right to change or even to add a dot on any kind of invoices active-official one or canceled if we do that or WHMCS auto systems do that,

this also creates us (into EU) huge penalty cost and crime issues.

How we solve this ? by our accounting dept. which backup - follow up all of our e-actions and creates the needed documentations, of course we speak about a huge work which accounting dept comes to cover but this is WHMCS..........

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This essentially means you would have to suspend all services on the day the service is due for renewal.

Yes you are right.

Edited July 11, 2018 by ody

[ju5t]

Sorry, I misinterpreted your reference to proforma invoices in the sentence "It will be official only if it will be paid by the client" and thought you meant normal invoices -- but you are right.

Our partial workaround is to export all invoices to our accounting software as soon as they are created. As our accounting software doesn't allow any changes so we've got most things covered. WHMCS can still change the invoices it has issued in its own system but at least we have some reference to fall back on. Customers can still pay too much or too little when WHMCS makes a change (e.g. when they pay via bank transfer based on an email they received while WHMCS has changed the invoice in the meantime) and that's taking up a lot of time lately. Unfortunately, even though this is on WHMCS' radar, nothing happens and we don't have much else we can do at this point.

[Kian]

16 hours ago, ju5t said:

Sorry, I misinterpreted your reference to proforma invoices in the sentence "It will be official only if it will be paid by the client" and thought you meant normal invoices -- but you are right.

Our partial workaround is to export all invoices to our accounting software as soon as they are created. As our accounting software doesn't allow any changes so we've got most things covered. WHMCS can still change the invoices it has issued in its own system but at least we have some reference to fall back on. Customers can still pay too much or too little when WHMCS makes a change (e.g. when they pay via bank transfer based on an email they received while WHMCS has changed the invoice in the meantime) and that's taking up a lot of time lately. Unfortunately, even though this is on WHMCS' radar, nothing happens and we don't have much else we can do at this point.

I understand what you are saying but I doubt that WHMCS team will do anything for the issues you're describing here. WHMCS is capable of generating invoices but it's not an accounting software.

Honestly, in my opinion, they shouldn't focus on this stuff at all. Being European companies doesn't make us special. I mean why should they fix our problems and ignore India, Turkey, China, Brazil, Nigeria etc.? Every single country of the world has it's own crazy rules and requirements about invoicing. I do not want WHMCS team focused on studying the regulations of every country on a yearly basis. Not to mention that even within the same country multiple exceptions exist including special tax regimes. I want them to focus on their stuff (integrating panels, servers, registrars...).

Don't get me wrong I understand and share your frustration. Not only I'm in EU but more precisely in Italy. If I ask the same question about invoicing to 10 accountants I'll get 25 different replies 🤨 That said, we can still fix all these issues and adapt WHMCS to our needs with hooks and APIs. I know that it's boring but there are no other options. I'm using WHMCS since 2008 and threads like this don't change anything probably because WHMCS team has the same view I described above. In your last example you described an issue that I managed to fix in a simple* way. Every time an overpayment occurs I issue a new invoice just for the overpayment making sure that the original invoice doesn't change.

* Actually it wasn't so simple. I mean yeah in the end it was simple but it took me days of tests

Edited July 12, 2018 by Kian

[ju5t]

Don't get me wrong, I don't want WHMCS to replace our accounting software at all. And I don't want them to focus on the EU alone either.

In essence all I'm looking for is a way to stop WHMCS from changing invoices automatically. The current grace/redemption feature is a great example of how this can go wrong. It will always change the original invoice, no matter if you choose to add the fees to an existing invoice or if you prefer a new invoice instead. Even when you go for a new invoice it removes the domain from the original invoice which is very confusing for us, but more importantly to the customer. I suggested to add a third option that complies with EU law -- and keeps the original functionality intact.

We've been using WHMCS since 2010 after having used ModernBill in the years before that. We have been able to work around some of the quirks in the past. I don't think it is up to us to create work arounds for problems affecting so many others.

[Remitur]

21 hours ago, ju5t said:

VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied, not when an invoice is paid. 

Precisely: VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied or when a payment has been done... what of the two come first.

If I pay you TODAY for a service youl'll provide in september, you're required to invoice my payment today, not at september.

[Kian]

3 hours ago, ju5t said:

Don't get me wrong, I don't want WHMCS to replace our accounting software at all. And I don't want them to focus on the EU alone either.

In essence all I'm looking for is a way to stop WHMCS from changing invoices automatically. The current grace/redemption feature is a great example of how this can go wrong. It will always change the original invoice, no matter if you choose to add the fees to an existing invoice or if you prefer a new invoice instead. Even when you go for a new invoice it removes the domain from the original invoice which is very confusing for us, but more importantly to the customer. I suggested to add a third option that complies with EU law -- and keeps the original functionality intact.

We've been using WHMCS since 2010 after having used ModernBill in the years before that. We have been able to work around some of the quirks in the past. I don't think it is up to us to create work arounds for problems affecting so many others.

Removing items from invoices is just wrong. I agree with you but speaking in general you know better then me that it's very unlikely that WHMCS team will address all these issues. They're USA-centric therefore invoicing is not handled rigorously. I know that my message sounds depressing but personally I learned to give up and adapt.

49 minutes ago, Remitur said:

Precisely: VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied or when a payment has been done... what of the two come first.

If I pay you TODAY for a service youl'll provide in september, you're required to invoice my payment today, not at september.

Some countries allow you to postpone invoicing up to 30 days but that's another story.

[ody]

As for Kian post, many of those you mention are in the right way as every EU country have it's own TAX and VAT rules and also other countries as USA, India etc. have their own very restrict rules so we all agree that invoicing and how we use them and mainly how WHMCS setup acts it's a very sensitive matter so WHMCS staff must be well informed (at first) before the act and they decide for us.

Also WHMCS staff and many EU citizens users must know and understand that the new GDPR EU rule (and in general The EU Personal Data Protection for citizens-countries under Schengen Agreement) have nothing to do with accounting,

It's other matter to do not sending promo mails to your clients if they don't want or to processing their personal data without their acceptance or to sold them-their data without their acceptance and 

it's totally different accounting issues,

We Don't Have The Right To Delete Any Kind Of Data Concerning To Commercial Transactions

even for active or inactive or canceled or fraud - clients or orders or ..... or ......

we don't have any right to touch these data, specially not to delete them or to change them or ......

so and at the end ju5t have a big right for his notices

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I do not want WHMCS team focused on studying the regulations of every country on a yearly basis. 

You are totally wrong and not only you but also and mainly WHMCS Staff who play with EU Regulations, Directives, Orders and Aggrements because

every one who wants to sell any kind of product or service into EU territory obligates to follow not only EU Rules but also every country's local rules!!! END!!!

Do you believe that you can create a car today and you can sell it tomorrow into EU, No my friend and the same exist for any product or service

do not forget that every WHMCS actions have impact to all 35.000 (as they mention) WHMCS users-buyers and to their-our clients about 100.000.000??? and this responsibilities WHMCS can't take them away.

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Precisely: VAT is chargeable at the moment the service is supplied or when a payment has been done... what of the two come first.

None of these 2 options, If your document TITLE mentioning Invoice then VAT is chargreable on the month of the date which invoice issued, the only way, (to avoid this and any VAT obligation so to wait if your client will pay for this service), is if your title mentioning Proforma Invoice.

[ju5t]

Before this explodes into a discussion about when VAT is and isn't due; that's not the point I am trying to make. It's about whether or not WHMCS should change invoices automatically.

I believe there are reasons not to do this no matter the country or continent you're from. Most changes are based on the assumption that customers always pay online. As much as I would like this, many of our customers still pay via bank transfer. If you send an email (even it's a proforma invoice) with the amount the customer is due and decide not to notify the customer of an automated change, customers will pay the wrong amount. I believe this can also happen when you e-mail PayPal links in your email. At the moment, customers are not informed and invoices are changed. This isn't a great experience for both ourselves as our customers.

I think it makes more sense to create a new invoice for the additional fee(s), link it to the domain in case of the grace/redemption feature and inform the customer as it happens. If you process a bank transfer and the domain is not renewed because extra fees are due, let the customer know. I think that this benefits everyone, companies in the US, India and Europe but more importantly, the customer.

I know WHMCS doesn't have a great track record and the general feeling is that most feature requests never see the light of day. For me that's not enough reason not to start a discussion. The more people talk about it, the more attention it may get from WHMCS. 

[Kian]

2 hours ago, ody said:

You are totally wrong and not only you but also and mainly WHMCS Staff who play with EU Regulations, Directives, Orders and Aggrements because

every one who wants to sell any kind of product or service into EU territory obligates to follow not only EU Rules but also every country's local rules!!! END!!!

Do you believe that you can create a car today and you can sell it tomorrow into EU, No my friend and the same exist for any product or service

I'm not against what you're saying. All your points are valid. I just think that they'll never do anything for these issues therefore we have to adapt with custom solutions or using 3rd-party modules.

It's not that they're arrogant and refuse to help us. For instance let's talk about e-commerce platforms like Magento, Prestashop, Woocommerce, osCommerce. They're all comparable to WHMCS. All these systems are used to sell products/services and they generate invoices all over the world.

Right out of the box none of them is "compatible" with EU regulations (VIES, Tax Exemption based on the concept of intra/extra EU and/or VAT Number validity and/or entity type company/individual, VAT MOSS, credit notes, charge tax on addfunds invoices etc.). And what about the regulations of my own country? In Italy for example we have things like Fatturazione elettronica (every 3 months we have to transmit all our invoices and clientsdetails to Revenue Agency via API in a very sophisticated and complicated way), Fatturazione PA (are your customers government institutions? Yes? Then you have to comply to crazy things that I won't even bother to explain), Codice Fiscale (ID number used to identify people that should be checked against the database of Revenue Agency) and many more things.

If you consider just me living in EU -> Italy they got tons of work to do. Multiply it by 190+ countries, federations, special tax regimes and boom! You'll need centuries to get the job done not considering that you still have to keep it uptodate in line with new laws and changes for all the subsequent years.

If every CMS, platform, system of the world that is capable of generating an invoice must follow every country's local rules probably there would be no Magento, Prestashop, WHMCS... From a developer's perspective I'll never write a single line of code if I MUST follow every federation and country's local rules. You can't create a system so flexible here is why all these systems have hooks, API, modules, widget and a community of developers that support them.

In conclusion I do understand that you are talking about very basic things that more or less are common in all countries but it's clear to me that WHMCS team won't do anything. There should be a precise reason why after more than 10 years they're not addressing these problems. Maybe it'is not part of their plans for reasons I explained above. Maybe they think «If we start making those things they will expect us to deal with laws and regulations and it's just crazy».

Edited July 12, 2018 by Kian

[ju5t]

WHMCS does a decent job when it comes to VIES and MOSS.

22 minutes ago, Kian said:

In conclusion I do understand that you are talking about very basic things that more or less are common in all countries but it's clear to me that WHMCS team won't do anything. There should be a precise reason why after more than 10 years they're not addressing these problems. Maybe it'is not part of their plans for reasons I explained above. Maybe they think «If we start making those things they will expect us to deal with laws and regulations and it's just crazy».

I think WHMCS' invoice changes have an impact on all companies no matter where they're from. I've illustrated that in my previous post. Companies in the EU will probably be affected more than others. I'm not asking them to implement a feature that's 'more or less the same in all countries', I'm asking them to add a feature that can stop automated changes. It's very specific. I'm not even talking about invoice changes you can make by hand. I don't expect them to create solutions for all rules and regulations local lawmakers find necessary, that would make the scope too large. It's a small change that solves a big problem for companies in the EU but also has its use for other companies around the world.

And to be fair, Europe is quite a large portion of the world. It wouldn't hurt to follow some regulations here and there.

Edited July 12, 2018 by ju5t