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Invoicing by country

One invoicing engine, a different document depending on where your business operates and which plan you have.

What it is

Cord doesn’t treat an invoice as a generic PDF with a number. The document type issued depends on your business country, your plan, and the tax setup you have ready. Once issued, a document keeps its type even if you later change plan or setup: a proforma doesn’t become a CFDI or vice versa.

The type is chosen when you create the invoice, in step 3 of the editor (Terms), in the Document type field: Pro forma invoice in Mexico and Spain or Invoice (a standard invoice) in the other markets, plus CFDI 4.0 or VERI*FACTU when your plan and tax setup allow it. An option your account can’t use yet appears disabled. Below it, the editor reminds you: “Commercial documents are included in Free. Integrated tax issuance requires Starter and an enabled tax setup. A pro forma invoice is not an invoice and is not valid for tax purposes.”

For the full life of an invoice (draft, issue, delivery, payment, credit notes, and voiding), see Create, issue, and collect invoices.

Which document is issued

Country	Free plan	Starter or higher
Mexico	Proforma (number with the PRO series)	CFDI 4.0 stamped with the SAT, with your CSD uploaded. You can also choose a proforma.
Spain	Proforma (PRO series)	Invoice registered with the AEAT through Verifactu (beta), with an electronic certificate uploaded. Without it, pro forma; see Spain.
Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Peru	Standard invoice	Standard invoice. When issuing with the country’s authority is active on your account, the authorized e-invoice (new feature; see Other markets); the other option then becomes Pro forma invoice (PRO series).
United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, and France	Standard invoice	Standard invoice

• Proforma: a commercial document that explicitly states it doesn’t replace a tax invoice. It’s for collecting and for your customer to process payment, not for tax deductions.
• Standard invoice (Invoice in the editor): an invoice with a sequential number, per-line taxes (sales tax, VAT, or GST/HST) and withholdings, and both parties’ tax details. Cord doesn’t file it with any authority. In the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom no authority receives each invoice, so this is your invoice.
• CFDI 4.0: Mexico’s digital tax receipt, stamped with the SAT using your business’s certificate.
• Authorized invoice: in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Peru, the e-invoice authorized by the country’s tax authority, with its legal number.

In all three cases, tax is calculated per line: you can mix a taxed item with an exempt one, and each prints your country’s tax name (IVA in Mexico and Spain, VAT in the United Kingdom, GST in Canada, Sales tax per state in the United States).

In the United States, from the Starter plan, you can turn on sales tax by the client’s address in Settings › Taxes: each line takes the combined state, county, city and special district rate for that address, and the document prints one row per jurisdiction. It needs your full business address, the states where you collect, and your payments account set up. In a state where you don’t collect, the line carries 0 % and the document says so; mark an exempt client in its profile with its certificate. If something is missing (for example, the client’s ZIP) or the calculation isn’t available, the document isn’t saved and tells you what’s missing: it never uses an estimated rate. Each plan includes a number of invoices with automatic sales tax per month; see Your Cord subscription.

Invoice language

The invoice takes its language when issued: the one your client has in their record or, if they have none, your account’s (see Document language). That language stays with the invoice: its PDF, its link, the email, and the reminders use it even if you change the record later. An invoice created from a quote takes the language the client has when it is issued, not the quote’s; a credit note, a debit note, or an invoice that replaces another takes its original invoice’s language. An invoice issued before per-client language existed keeps its PDF in the language of your business’s country.

The language changes the text Cord writes, not what the law requires:

• France: the invoice must be in French. With a client in another language, the PDF puts French first and the client’s language alongside (“FACTURE / INVOICE”), with dates and numbers in French format.
• Legal notices: the ones the law requires in its own language (reverse charge in Spain, France, and Germany, the VAT exemption for small businesses in France and Germany, France’s business-to-business payment terms, and the Verifactu legend and QR code) stay in that language.
• Documents Cord doesn’t draw: the stamped CFDI PDF in Mexico comes out in Spanish, and the NF-e DANFE in Brazil, in Portuguese. In Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Peru, the data the authority returns stays as it returns it.
• E-invoicing: the XML files don’t change with the client’s language.

Each country’s PDF language is in Invoicing by country.

Quotas per plan

Invoices have their own monthly quotas, separate from quote sends:

Plan	Standard invoices and proformas per month	Tax documents (CFDI or Verifactu) included per month
Free	10	No tax issuing
Starter	Unlimited	30
Pro	Unlimited	200
Scale	Unlimited	500
Developer	Unlimited	1,000

• Beyond the included tax quota, from Starter up, additional documents are billed as usage overage on your subscription. See Subscription.
• In Mexico, each payment complement Cord stamps counts as one more tax document.
• On Free, after 10 standard invoices and proformas in a month, issuing stops until the next month or until you change plans.
• Drafts and test documents don’t consume quota.
• Running out of quota or downgrading does not block downloading, sending, or collecting documents already issued.

Subscribing to a plan doesn’t turn on tax issuing by itself: in Mexico you also need your CSD uploaded, and in Spain, your electronic certificate.

Mexico: CFDI 4.0

With Starter or higher, Cord stamps with the SAT through a certified provider, under your business’s RFC and Digital Seal Certificate (CSD). You upload the CSD once in Settings › Tax details and never attach it again. See Digital Seal Certificate.

Recipient details

Cord takes the recipient’s tax details from the customer record:

Item	Source	If missing
RFC	Customer record	Issued with the generic RFC XAXX010101000, in the customer’s name and with your business’s tax postal code. The name “PUBLICO EN GENERAL” is reserved for the global invoice.
Tax regime	Customer record	601 (General corporate regime) if the customer has an RFC; 616 (No tax obligations) whenever it is issued with the generic RFC.
CFDI use	Customer record, or your account’s default use	G03 (General expenses).
Tax postal code	Customer record	There’s no value that can safely replace it: CFDI 4.0 requires the postal code on the recipient’s tax certificate, and stamping may be rejected.

The defaults may not match your customer’s tax certificate (constancia de situación fiscal). Cord doesn’t invent them from other data: complete them in the record before issuing so the CFDI is useful to whoever receives it.

Customers abroad

If the customer’s country in their record isn’t Mexico, the CFDI is issued to a foreign resident: with the SAT generic foreign RFC (XEXX010101000), their tax residence (the country in the record), use S01 and, if you entered their tax ID (EIN, NIF, VAT…), that number as the foreign tax registration number. The tax regime and CFDI use in the record don’t apply to a foreign customer and aren’t sent. The VAT rate on each item is your call with your accountant; for example, exported services usually go at 0%.

SAT keys for each item

Each product can carry its product or service key (c_ClaveProdServ, 8 digits) and its unit key (c_ClaveUnidad) under Products › E-invoicing (SAT). You search the product key by description in the SAT catalog; if you leave the unit key empty, it’s derived from the product’s unit (“hour” → HUR, “month” → MON, “kg” → KGM). In the quote and invoice editors, each item can carry its own keys, which win over the product’s; duplicating a document keeps them. Items with no keys of their own and no classified product are stamped with the SAT generic keys: 01010101 and H87, and the editor tells you how many are left that way before issuing. Keys are read when stamping and saved in the document.

Taxes and issuing

Cord sends each item’s taxes as you entered them: 16% IVA, 8% IVA, or exempt, plus IVA and ISR withholdings. It doesn’t collapse them into a single rate. If the quote is in a currency different from your accounting currency, the CFDI declares the exchange rate locked at quoting time. A document discount travels spread per item in the Descuento attribute.

In the invoice editor, the CFDI details section lets you set that invoice’s CFDI use (by default, From the client’s record) and Payment method (by default, Automatic from the payments). If you replace the invoice, the replacement inherits them.

A confirmed payment and an issued invoice are different states. Paying doesn’t create, stamp, or send an invoice by itself; check each document’s tax and delivery status. If stamping succeeds and the email fails, the number is kept and you can resend from the detail page.

Credit notes for a Mexican invoice are an expense CFDI (egreso) related to the original UUID. A cancellation request doesn’t void the CFDI until the SAT confirms it; meanwhile you can click Check cancellation status on the detail page.

Payment method: PUE or PPD

When stamping, Cord sets the CFDI’s payment method from what actually happened with the money:

Situation when stamping	Method	Payment form
The invoice is already fully paid (on its link, on the source quote, or with payments you recorded)	PUE, single payment	The payment’s: 04 card, 03 transfer (including SPEI), 01 cash, 02 check. If you set one under CFDI details, that one.
The invoice will be collected later, in full or in installments (for example, Net 30)	PPD, installments or deferred	99, to be defined
The recipient is the general public (generic RFC XAXX010101000)	Always PUE: that recipient doesn’t accept payment complements	The payment’s, or 03 if there’s none yet

Cord used to stamp everything as PUE even when the invoice was on credit. Not anymore: an invoice that isn’t paid when issued goes out as PPD, as the SAT requires.

Automatic payment complement

For each payment a PPD invoice receives, the SAT requires a payment receipt complement (type P CFDI, also called REP) no later than the 5th of the following month. Cord stamps it by itself, as soon as the payment is recorded:

• However the payment is recorded: a card, SPEI, or Mercado Pago payment on the invoice link (SPEI is recorded only when the full transfer arrives), a payment from the client portal or automatic payments, a payment you record by hand, or the source quote’s payments applied to the invoice.
• One complement per payment. Each payment gets its own, related to the invoice’s UUID and with its installment number and previous balance. A retry never stamps the same payment twice.
• Complement payment form: the payment’s (04 card, 03 transfer, including SPEI on the invoice or the quote, 01 cash, 02 check); if it can’t be known, 03.
• It uses your tax quota: each complement counts as one tax document for the month.
• It’s recorded in the invoice history: “Payment complement issued” with its tax folio (UUID). If it couldn’t be stamped, the history says “Payment complement pending” with the reason.

Cord does not issue it by itself, and says so in the invoice history, in two cases the SAT documents differently:

Case	What to do
The payment is in a currency other than MXN.	The complement needs the official exchange rate for the payment date, which Cord doesn’t have. Issue it with your accountant.
The payment is earlier than the invoice (an advance).	It’s documented with the SAT’s advance-payment procedure, not with a payment complement.

If a complement doesn’t go out (because of an error, because the payment is in another currency or because an attempt got stuck), Cord creates a high-priority task linked to the invoice, due two days before the 5th of the month after the payment, and closes it on its own once the complement is issued. An advance payment doesn’t create a task.

Cancellation and replacement

When you void an issued CFDI, Cord asks for the SAT reason: 02 (with errors, without a replacement), 03 (the transaction did not take place) or 04 (named transaction in a global invoice, only on the global invoice). Reason 01 is used through Replace CFDI: Cord creates a draft with the original’s data, relates it to the original when you issue it (relationship 04), moves the original’s payments to it and requests the original’s cancellation under reason 01 with the replacement’s UUID. An invoice with valid credit notes or issued payment complements can’t be replaced: the SAT doesn’t allow cancelling a CFDI with valid related documents. The SAT only allows cancelling a CFDI until the month of the annual return for the year it was issued: March of the following year if the issuer’s RFC belongs to a legal entity and April if it belongs to an individual. Within that period, the void dialog tells you until when you can cancel it; after it, Cord no longer offers to void or replace it, and you correct it with a credit note.

Global invoice

Sales collected without the customer asking for an invoice are documented under Invoices › Global invoice: you choose the frequency, month and year, Cord lists the quotes collected in the period with no invoice of their own and no other global invoice, and issues a CFDI to PUBLICO EN GENERAL (XAXX010101000, regime 616, use S01, PUE) with one item per sale (key 01010101, unit ACT and the quote number as identification number). A sale in a valid global invoice can’t be invoiced separately; if the customer asks for their invoice, the global invoice is cancelled under reason 04 and issued again without that sale.

What Cord doesn’t do in Mexico today

• Payment complement for a payment in another currency or an advance. See Automatic payment complement.
• Foreign trade complement (Comercio Exterior). Definitive export of goods (key A1) requires it and Cord doesn’t issue it. That’s why, if a CFDI has goods items (SAT keys for goods) for a client with an address outside Mexico, Cord stops before stamping and asks you to confirm it isn’t an export, for example because the goods are delivered in Mexico; the CFDI and its history keep that confirmation. If it is an export, issue that CFDI with your accountant. Through the API you confirm with sin_comercio_exterior: true when issuing; a recurring invoice or a workflow can’t confirm it and stops.

Spain: Verifactu

Verifactu is the invoicing system required by Spanish law: each invoice generates a record chained to the previous one and sent to the Spanish Tax Agency.

What Cord does today

• It registers every invoice. With Starter or higher and your electronic certificate uploaded, each invoice is registered with the Tax Agency through Verifactu. This feature is in beta.
• Without Verifactu, everything goes out as a pro forma invoice. Without a certificate, on the Free plan or with registration not active, the document goes out as a pro forma invoice with the PRO series: its PDF is titled “FACTURA PROFORMA” and says it isn’t an invoice, it carries no fingerprint or verification QR, and it isn’t registered with the Tax Agency. The law requires the system used to invoice in Spain to register every invoice (Royal Decree 1007/2023), so Cord doesn’t issue invoices in Spain outside Verifactu. A pro forma invoice doesn’t allow credit notes or e-invoices.
• It doesn’t fake tax issuing. If you explicitly request a tax invoice without Verifactu ready, Cord rejects it and tells you how to turn it on, instead of issuing a document that pretends to have a record.

The law makes it mandatory from January 1, 2027 for businesses that pay Corporate Income Tax, and from July 1, 2027 for everyone else (Royal Decree-law 15/2025).

How to turn it on

In Settings › Tax profile, Verifactu section (Spain accounts only), upload your electronic certificate (.p12 or .pfx) with its password. Cord validates the password, reads the expiry date, and stores the certificate encrypted; from then on the section says Verifactu active. Also make sure your NIF is in your tax details.

What each registered invoice carries

With Starter or higher and a valid certificate:

• Each invoice generates a chained record with a digital fingerprint that links it to your business’s previous invoice.
• The PDF carries the Tax Agency’s verification QR code at the top, with the legend “Factura verificable en la sede electrónica de la AEAT” below it.
• The record is sent to the Tax Agency after issuing. Issuing doesn’t wait for that response: the submission status (accepted, rejected…) shows on the invoice detail, and a rejected one is corrected from there with Correct and resend.
• A registered invoice isn’t edited: it’s corrected with a new correction or cancellation record.

Full details in Spain.

Other markets: standard invoice

In the United States, Canada, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Colombia, Argentina, Chile, and Peru, Cord issues a standard invoice with a sequential number per organization, per-line taxes and withholdings, and both parties’ tax details. Cord doesn’t file it with the local tax authority. Whether you must issue, report, or complement that document depends on your country and regime; confirm with your tax advisor.

• Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Peru. Cord can issue the e-invoice authorized by each country’s tax authority (ARCA in Argentina; NFS-e and NF-e in Brazil; SII in Chile; DIAN in Colombia; SUNAT in Peru), with Starter or higher and your business’s credentials in Settings › Tax profile. When issuing is active on your account, the invoice carries the legal number the authority assigns and the Commercial invoice option goes out as a proforma. Until then, you keep issuing standard invoices.
• Germany, France, and Spain. Each invoice can also be downloaded as a European e-invoice (Factur-X, XRechnung, Peppol, and, in Spain, Facturae). In France, issuing through an approved platform is built and coming soon. See European e-invoicing.

The tax receipt for Cord’s fee (Mexico)

Besides the CFDIs you issue to your customers, in Mexico Cord issues its own income CFDI for the fee it charges on your MXN Cord Payments payments (see Fees). It’s the receipt for the processing service Cord provides you, not for your sale.

• It’s monthly and consolidated: one CFDI per month with the sum of that month’s fees, not one per payment.
• Cord reviews it before stamping: at the start of each month the previous month’s draft is prepared and recipient, base, IVA, and total are checked before issuing.
• It’s issued to your tax details: RFC, tax regime, and postal code from Settings › Tax details, with your account’s CFDI use or G03 if there’s none, and the PUE payment method.
• Mexico only. Outside Mexico, the payment receipt is your document.

The CFDI for your Cord subscription is requested separately, from your subscription billing, for each payment already settled. See Subscription.

Limits

• CFDI: Mexico only, from Starter, with a CSD uploaded.
• Spain: invoice registered with Verifactu (beta) from Starter, with a certificate uploaded; without it, pro forma.
• Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Peru: authorized invoice only when its issuing is active on your account; otherwise, standard invoice.
• Other markets: standard invoice not filed with the authority.
• Free: 10 standard invoices and proformas per month and no tax issuing.
• Mexico: the payment complement is automatic for MXN payments after the invoice; payments in another currency and advances are documented outside Cord.

Common problems

My invoice came out as a proforma and I expected a CFDI. Check your plan (Starter or higher), that your CSD is uploaded and valid, and that CFDI 4.0, not Pro forma, is selected in Document type (step 3, Terms).

My CFDI came out PPD and I expected PUE. When it was stamped, the invoice wasn’t fully paid. Cord will issue a payment complement for each payment it receives. If the invoice was already paid, check that the payment was recorded before issuing it.

My customer says their CFDI is unusable. Check their tax regime, postal code, and CFDI use in their record; if they were missing, Cord used defaults.

I’m in Spain and uploaded my certificate, but I still issue pro formas. Check your plan (Starter or higher), that Settings › Tax profile says Verifactu active, and that VERI*FACTU, not Pro forma, is selected in Document type.

I hit the document limit on Free. Issuing resumes next month or when you change plans. Your issued documents remain available.

Related

• Invoicing by country: one page for each of the 12 markets
• Create, issue, and collect invoices
• Recurring invoices
• Digital Seal Certificate
• Stamping from the quote
• Discounts and coupons
• European e-invoicing
• Subscription