Verifactu and Spanish e-invoicing: does it apply, and from when?

Your invoice keeps the usual details, but your software will also create a record of each invoice with a hash, a SHA-256 digest that chains each record to the previous one. If someone deletes or changes an invoice, the chain breaks and it shows. The printed invoice or PDF carries a QR code with the words “QR tributario:” above it and, if the software sends records to the Tax Agency, the caption “Factura verificable en la sede electrónica de la AEAT”.

Your customer can scan that QR and see on the AEAT website whether the invoice is on record. The QR reader does it without installing anything. To see how the hash is computed or how the QR URL is built, the hash calculator and the QR generator reproduce the official examples in the AEAT specification.

Article 3 of RD 1007/2023 covers corporate income taxpayers, self-employed people taxed on business income, non-residents with a permanent establishment and pass-through entities such as joint ownerships. It excludes businesses on the SII and entities fully exempt under article 9.1 of the Corporate Income Tax Act. Article 1.3 leaves out anyone with a tax domicile in the Basque Country or Navarre, which have their own rules.

Being on the flat-rate scheme does not exempt you: if you invoice with software, you must comply. Business size and invoice count do not matter either. What decides is whether you use software to invoice, even for part of your invoices. Details by profile are on Verifactu for the self-employed, SII and TicketBAI.

The regulation offers two modes. In VERI*FACTU mode the software sends each record to the Tax Agency straight away, with no need to sign records electronically or keep an event log. In the other mode the software keeps records signed with XAdES Enveloped (ETSI EN 319 132), keeps an event log and hands everything over if the tax office asks.

The first is simpler to comply with and gives the customer certainty that the invoice is on record. The second allows invoicing offline but asks more of the software. You can move to VERI*FACTU at any time, but once you start sending records you must stay with it at least until the end of that calendar year. The full comparison is on VERI*FACTU or non-VERI*FACTU.

Law 18/2022, known as Crea y Crece, requires e-invoices between businesses and self-employed people. RD 238/2026 sets out how: UBL, CII, EDIFACT or Facturae formats, delivery through private platforms or the Tax Agency’s public solution, and reporting of invoice status, payment above all, within 4 days.

Order HAC/1028/2026 came into force on 6 October 2026. By our calculation that gives 6 October 2027 for businesses above €8,000,000 and 6 October 2028 for everyone else. Check your case with the mandatory e-invoicing checker.

Since 15 January 2015, companies and the other entities listed in article 4 of Law 25/2013 must invoice public bodies in Facturae format, signed and filed through the general entry point, FACe for central government. Public bodies may exempt invoices up to €5,000.

The Facturae creator produces an unsigned 3.2.2 file validated against the official schema; you then sign it with the official app or AutoFirma. If you receive a Facturae file, the viewer shows it as a readable invoice.

Verifactu also covers till receipts, which in law are simplified invoices. Article 4 of the Invoicing Regulation allows them up to €400 including VAT, and up to €3,000 in retail, hospitality, passenger transport and other activities. Each receipt creates its own record and carries its QR.

Corrective invoices have their own series and a reason code, R1 to R5, that the software puts in the record. You can correct for 4 years from the tax point. See the simplified invoice and the corrective invoice, each with its own calculator.