Automate Legal Invoice Retrieval

Automate your legal invoice retrieval using your own SFTP server.

Introduction

Archiving legal invoices is a regulatory obligation for both suppliers and customers. With Compliance-as-a-Service (CaaS) for e-Invoicing, Coupa generates the legal invoice on your behalf in supported countries. While you can download your legal invoices through the Coupa Supplier Portal (CSP), it is currently a manual process.

To make this process easier, you can now specify your own SFTP server endpoint to download legal invoices for your Coupa customers who use CaaS for e-Invoicing. Coupa batches the legal invoices and any supporting invoice attachments and sends the batched ZIP file to your SFTP server.

Note:

You need to have an SFTP client to create the connection.

Your customers must use CaaS for you to use this feature. Contact your customer if you want to use this feature.

How it works

When you set up your SFTP endpoint, you create a single endpoint for all of your customers who use CaaS. Using this endpoint, Coupa delivers one batched ZIP file that contains one ZIP file per invoice contained in the batch. Each batch can be up to 15 MB. Coupa only sends invoices once; after they've been sent to you, they aren't resent.

Table 1.
File TypeIncluded FilesNaming Convention
Batch ZIP file

Each batch ZIP file contains:

  • One ZIP file per invoice included in the batch
  • One batch metadata file that contains information about the ZIP files contained in the batch

Batch ZIP files use the following naming convention: [customer name]-[supplier name]-[datetime stamp]-[batch ID]

Invoice ZIP file

Each invoice ZIP file contains:

  • Legal invoice
  • Coupa-generated attachments, if there are any
  • Supplier-provided attachments, if there are any
  • One invoice metadata file that shows information about the invoice

Invoice ZIP files use the following naming convention: [invoice number]-[country of origin abbreviation]

If you merge your CSP account with another CSP, the parent account's SFTP endpoint is used for all customers (those from both the parent and child accounts). If the parent account doesn't have an SFTP connection and the child account does, the child account's SFTP endpoint is deleted. In this case, you need to create a new SFTP endpoint if you want to automate your legal invoice retrieval.

You can check SFTP statuses and errors on the SFTP File Status (from Customers) page.

Tip:

If you don't know which of your customers use CaaS, hover over the View customers using this service link in the SFTP Data from Customers section on the Setup > Admin > SFTP Accounts page to see a list of your customers that use CaaS.

Create an SFTP endpoint

When you create an SFTP endpoint, you specify your server information that Coupa uses to deliver your legal invoices through. Once setup is complete, Coupa begins sending you batches of invoices.

  1. Go to Setup > Admin > SFTP Accounts.
  2. In the SFTP Data from Customers section, click Add at the top of the table.
Note:

If you don't see this section, none of your customers use CaaS.

  1. In the Add Outbound SFTP Account window that appears, complete the fields. The following table describes each field's name and its description:
    Table 2.
    FieldDescription
    ServerEnter the URL of your SFTP server.
    UsernameEnter your username that you use to log into your SFTP account.
    PasswordEnter the password you use to log into your SFTP account.
    Confirm PasswordConfirm the password you entered in the previous field.
    PortPort 22 is selected by default and can't be changed.
  2. Select the checkbox to enroll in automated file transfers.
Note:

If you aren't ready to enroll in automated transfers, wait to create your SFTP endpoint.

  1. Click Save.
Note:

After you save, you can't edit your SFTP endpoint. Delete the endpoint and create a new one if you need to make changes.

  1. Contact your Coupa customers who use CaaS so they can enable the feature on their end.

Review SFTP file status and errors

You can review your SFTP files, file status, and errors by going to Setup > Admin > SFTP File Status (from Customers).

The FTP File Status (from Customers) page displays a data table with the following column headers:

Table 3.
ColumnDescription
Status

The status of the file:

  • New: The batch has been identified but not generated yet.
  • Generated: The batch has been generated and is ready to send.
  • Uploading: The batch is in the process of uploading and sending.
  • Sent: The batch was sent successfully.
  • Failed: The batch failed to send. Contact your customer for assistance.
File Name

Name of the file that was sent.

Note:

Files are named using the following convention: [customer name]-[supplier name]-[datetime stamp]-[batch ID].

SentDate the file was sent by Coupa.
Error

The delivery error, if one occurred.