PEPPOL software: pricing and how to choose an access point

A PEPPOL access point is priced per transaction, not as a flat fee - the actual number depends on your document volume and the provider you request a quote from. No serious provider publishes a fixed price list. What you do get is a clear choice: connect to a ready-made provider, or get your own access point certified.

This article covers exactly that - not what PEPPOL is (we covered that in PEPPOL access point: what it is and when you need one), but how to choose a solution and what pricing logic to expect.

Why PEPPOL does not have a SaaS-style price list

Search for "peppol software pricing" or "peppol access point cost" and you will land on "Contact us for a quote" forms, not a pricing table. That is not a marketing trick. Pricing depends on variables the provider does not know upfront:

• Document volume. Tens of invoices a month is a different economics than tens of thousands.
• Direction of traffic. Sending only, or also receiving invoices via PEPPOL.
• Connection to your system. A ready-made API connection to Business Central is a different job than integrating with an older custom ERP.
• Support and SLA level. Uptime guarantees and incident response speed feed into the price.

That is why pricing across the Czech Republic and the EU tends to be transaction-based - you pay per document, sometimes combined with a small monthly base fee. You need to request specific numbers, because they differ by provider and by your volume. Anyone who gives you a number without knowing your volume is guessing, not quoting.

Two paths to PEPPOL

Before comparing prices, decide this: do you want to connect to a ready-made provider, or build your own access point?

Path 1: Connect to a ready-made provider

Faster to start. You connect your ERP or invoicing system to a certified access point provider via API, and the provider handles certification, security, and network operations for you. You pay per transaction or a flat fee.

In the Czech Republic, certified providers include Dativery s.r.o. with its Peppoš product, or ESO9. On the broader European market, international providers exist too (Qvalia, Digiteal, and others) - if you invoice across the EU, a provider with wider coverage may be worth considering.

This path makes sense for the vast majority of companies. Less control over the infrastructure, but significantly less operational burden and a faster ramp-up.

Path 2: Get certified as your own access point

More expensive and slower to start. You go through OpenPeppol's certification process - meeting technical and security requirements, signing an agreement with the authority, and running your own infrastructure with everything that entails (uptime, monitoring, security audits).

This makes sense in only two situations: either your volume is large enough that running your own infrastructure is cheaper than transaction fees at a provider, or you sell access point capability as a product to your own customers. For a company that just wants to invoice, this path is unnecessarily expensive and slow.

How to choose PEPPOL software or a provider

When comparing offers, ask about this - not just the price per document:

Certification with OpenPeppol. Verify the provider is actually a certified access point, not just a reseller of someone else's infrastructure with unclear accountability.

Support for BIS Billing 3.0 and EN 16931. The invoice must comply with the PEPPOL BIS Billing 3.0 format, which is also a CIUS of the EN 16931 standard. If a provider only talks about "XML transmission" without mentioning these standards, ask further.

What happens on failure. This is the question that separates a professional integration from a prototype. Does submission carry an idempotent identifier so a retry does not create a duplicate invoice? Is delivery acknowledgement from the receiver's access point tracked? Is there an audit log and alerting on failure? If a vendor answers these with silence or "that doesn't really happen", expect the first network outage to silently lose an invoice.

Connection to your specific system. Connecting to Business Central or another standardized ERP is faster and cheaper than integrating with an older custom system with a non-standard data structure. Ask whether the provider or integrator has direct experience with your system.

How we approach PEPPOL integration

We build PEPPOL integrations on certified access point providers rather than our own infrastructure - for the vast majority of clients, that is the faster path to a working solution. But we connect it to your ERP or invoicing system with the same focus on reliability we established on our KSeF integration work: idempotent submission, tracking document state through to acknowledgement, an audit log, and alerting on failure.

We proved this approach on more than 40,000 documents submitted to KSeF with a 100% delivery rate, and during a forensic recovery we tracked down 15,141 invoices that a previous fire-and-forget integration had silently lost. The same machinery applies to PEPPOL - the format and the endpoint change, the principle does not.

Where we can help

If you are deciding between connecting to a ready-made PEPPOL provider or a larger project involving your own certification, or you need to connect an access point to your ERP, get in touch. We will walk through your volume, your system, and what you actually need - before you commit to a specific provider.

FAQ

How much does a PEPPOL access point cost?

PEPPOL access point providers usually do not publish price lists. Pricing is typically transaction-based - you pay per document sent or received, sometimes combined with a small monthly fee. You get a real number on request from a provider (for example Dativery with its Peppoš product, or ESO9) once they know your document volume and the integration you need. Do not trust a quote given without knowledge of your volume.

What PEPPOL software should I choose?

It depends on whether you want a ready-made access point provider or a direct API connection into your ERP. The key criteria: certification with OpenPeppol, support for PEPPOL BIS Billing 3.0 and EN 16931, an uptime SLA, and whether the vendor handles idempotence, retry, and delivery tracking - or just "sends the XML and hopes". That last point decides whether the integration survives its first outage.

Can I build my own PEPPOL access point?

Technically yes, but in practice it only makes sense at very high volume, or if you sell access point capability as a product yourself. OpenPeppol certification requires meeting security and technical requirements and takes months, not weeks. For the vast majority of companies, connecting to an existing certified provider via API is faster and cheaper.

Is there a difference between a PEPPOL access point and PEPPOL software?

An access point is the certified network node the document physically passes through - that certification belongs to the provider, not to you. PEPPOL software is the layer on your side that prepares the invoice in BIS Billing 3.0 format, sends it to the access point, and processes the acknowledgement. Most companies need this software connected to an access point as a service, not their own access point.