Intercompany Order

E-invoicing in Germany: How to implement the obligation with SAP Business One

One Intercompany Order is a procurement process between two legally independent companies that belong to the same group – for example, between a parent company and a subsidiary or between two sister companies. From the perspective of SAP Business One, the purchasing company is a Creditor, the supplying company a Debtor; The particularity lies in the fact that both sides book within the same corporate group and the documents must be mirrored.

Context

Multiple SAP B1 clients are being accessed via the intercompany integration Solution (ICI) integrated, a free SAP add-on that automatically synchronises documents between companies: a purchase order in Company A creates a sales order in Company B, the goods receipt and delivery there are mirrored, and the outgoing invoice from B is automatically created as an incoming invoice in A. On this basis, it is also possible base data (Articles, business partners, price lists), journal entries and consolidation data are reconciled between the companies. In the simpler case without ICI, the intercompany order is manually mirrored or mapped via B1if scenarios. Pricing and margins follow the group's internal transfer pricing – transfer pricing regulations are relevant for this. From a VAT perspective, intercompany deliveries depend on the country combination, being intra-EU supplies, triangular transactions, or reverse charge cases – accordingly tax code and to consistently set VAT ID numbers in the order, invoice, and mirror posting.

Demarcation

An intercompany order is not a purely internal stock transfer - that would be the Stock transfer within a tenant. It is also not a classic Drop shipmentIn drop-shipping, an external supplier delivers directly to the end customer, while in an intercompany order, two group companies exchange goods or services. Compared to a normal supplier order, it requires increased consistency in master data, tax logic, and booking timings, as deviations directly impact group consolidation.