BR-09 Seller country code missing

The seller's address needs a country code, such as DE or FR.

What the rule says

The Seller postal address (BG-5) shall contain a Seller country code (BT-40).

The rule's official wording (CEN / KoSIT). The German XRechnung rules are published in German.

Why it happens

The seller's address has no country code (BT-40), or the country is written out instead of as a code.

How to fix it

Use the two-letter ISO code, such as DE, AT, FR or NL, not the country's name.

Applies to

Every EN 16931 e-invoice: XRechnung, ZUGFeRD / Factur-X, Peppol and others.

Check your invoice again Create an invoice that passes

More about BR-09

The seller's country code decides which country's VAT applies to the seller, and other rules depend on it: for example, rules about reverse charge and intra-EU supplies compare the seller's and the buyer's countries. That's why it's required even when both parties are obviously in the same country.

Use the two-letter code from ISO 3166-1: DE for Germany, AT for Austria, CH for Switzerland, FR for France. Note that Greece is GR in addresses, even though Greek VAT IDs start with EL.

The fields involved

BT-40 Seller country code: CII ram:SellerTradeParty/ram:PostalTradeAddress/ram:CountryID; UBL cac:AccountingSupplierParty/cac:Party/cac:PostalAddress/cac:Country/cbc:IdentificationCode

Typical situations

The country was typed as "Deutschland" or "Germany" in a free-text field.
Domestic invoices were made with the country left blank, since it seemed unnecessary.
The country was put in the last address line instead of the country field.

Example

The country inside the seller's address in CII:

<ram:PostalTradeAddress>
  ...
  <ram:CountryID>DE</ram:CountryID>
</ram:PostalTradeAddress>