E-invoicing in Iceland: how to bill the state, a municipality or a company

A school orders packed lunches for a field trip. A ministry orders coffee and pastries for a morning meeting. The invoice must reach the buyer in a form that its finance office accepts, or the payment waits.

For the state and for Reykjavík, that form is an electronic invoice. This guide explains how a restaurant or caterer can send one, as of October 2026.

What an electronic invoice is

An electronic invoice is a structured file in XML format. The buyer’s financial system reads it directly, line by line, with no typing. A PDF looks like an invoice to a person, but a computer cannot read it in the same way. For this reason, the Ministry of Finance says that a PDF invoice is not an electronic invoice.²

Electronic invoices travel through a skeytamiðlari (a message broker), or through Peppol, an international network for business documents.¹ In practice, your accounting system or a service provider sends the file for you. You do not need to write XML yourself.

Invoicing the state

The Ministry of Finance decided that from 1 January 2020, all invoices for the state’s purchases of goods and services must be electronic.² Fjársýslan (the Financial Management Authority) receives invoices on behalf of most state bodies. Its rules are:¹

• Paper invoices issued after 1 January 2020 are returned with a request for an electronic invoice.
• PDF invoices sent by email are not accepted.
• Invoices must be XML and come through a message broker or the Peppol network.

If you have no accounting system that can send electronic invoices, Fjársýslan has a simple web page where you can enter an invoice and send it to a state body.¹ This suits a small caterer that bills the state a few times a year.

The invoice must describe what you sold. The price must cover all costs, and the invoice must show the account for payment and payment terms that match your agreement.¹

Electronic invoicing is not new for the state. It started in 2007, and by January 2019 about 70 % of the invoices that the state received were electronic.³

The rules behind it

Regulation no. 44/2019 says that public buyers must receive and process electronic invoices that follow the European standard EN 16931, as Staðlaráð Íslands has adapted it for Iceland in the specification TS 236.⁴ State bodies had to be ready by 18 April 2019. Municipalities, their institutions and public companies had to be ready by 18 April 2020.⁴

The current Icelandic specification is ÍST TS 236:2021. It is based on Peppol BIS Billing 3.0 and EN 16931.⁵ Your accounting system or message broker takes care of this format. What matters for you is the content of the invoice and the buyer’s reference numbers.

Municipalities, with Reykjavík as the example

Reykjavík says that all invoices to the city must be sent electronically.⁶ The city has agreements with three message brokers: Inexchange, Unimaze (Sendill) and Advania. Payday, Regla and Konto also offer ways to send invoices to the city.⁶ If your systems have no connection to a message broker, you can enter the invoice by hand in the city’s invoice portal. You log in with electronic ID first.⁶

The invoice must show the right kennitala and name, and the name of the cost centre or department.⁶ Most city departments, including the Department of Education and Youth, use the kennitala of the Municipal Fund, 530269-7609. The Real Estate Fund uses 570480-0149.⁶ The invoice must list the products or services with quantity, unit and unit price. If the buyer gives you a cost centre number, a request number or the name of the person who ordered, put them on the invoice too.⁶

Reykjavík asks for invoices on the same day as the sale, and pays within 30 days unless you agree otherwise. If an invoice goes to the wrong place, or has too little information to confirm it, the payment deadline does not apply.⁶

Other municipalities have their own instructions. Ask the person who orders for the kennitala, the cost centre and any reference number before you make the invoice.

When a city employee pays with a procurement card

Some city buyers have procurement cards, which are payment cards. This is common when an employee buys lunch or coffee on the spot. When a city employee pays with one, Reykjavík asks the seller to do one of two things:⁶

1. Give the buyer a printed original invoice, and do not send it electronically.
2. Give the buyer a receipt, and send an electronic invoice to the city that clearly says that it is already paid. The invoice must show the last 5 digits of the card.

Invoicing companies

No law in Iceland requires electronic invoices between companies today. The government’s list of planned bills for the 2026–2027 session of Alþingi has no bill on this.⁷ Many larger companies prefer electronic invoices, because their finance teams work the same way as the state’s. If a company asks for one, the same accounting system and message broker can usually send it.

A checklist before your first invoice to a public buyer

1. Get the buyer’s kennitala and name, the cost centre or department, and any order or request number.
2. Ask your accounting system provider if your system can send electronic invoices, and through which message broker. dk, Regla and Payday, for example, all offer this, sometimes for an extra fee.
3. If you have no such system, use the Fjársýslan web page for the state or the city’s portal for Reykjavík.
4. Put the full price on the invoice, with all costs included.
5. Add the bank account for payment and the agreed payment terms.
6. Attach supporting documents, such as an order confirmation, as a PDF inside the electronic invoice. Reykjavík says that a link to a document is not enough.⁶
7. Send the invoice on the day of the sale.

From the POS to the electronic invoice

In Resto, the server charges the check to a house account or adds the company’s kennitala to it. Resto then creates a separate sales invoice for that company in your accounting system, such as dk, Regla or Payday. Your accounting system sends it to the buyer as an electronic invoice, when it is set up to do so. Read more about Resto and your accounting system.