Store documents for SAP installations in Germany

[Former Member]

Hi All,

One of our clients has a single instance of SAP in Germany. It seems that according to the German VAT law we are NOT allowed to electronically store any documents such as invoices or credit notes on servers outside the European Union.

I wanted to check if this is true and if anyone has encountered a similar situation for SAP implementations on Germany and how did you deal with this scenario.

Any feedback/comments will be very helpful.

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Regards,

Vivek

Edited by: Julius Bussche on May 29, 2009 11:10 PM

[Former Member]

Sometimes for legal reasons the data needs to be stored physically within Germany.

I am not aware that you may not store it outside Germany... I guess that is your company policy.

Of course, it might be possible to delete it from outside of Germany? And the backup media might not be in Germany, or available at all.

Also, what about a German person accessing the data from another country while on a business trip?

Good security is better than legal requirements in my opinion, but it does help (sometimes) to "standardize" stuff.

My 2 cents,

Julius

[Former Member]

Hi Julius,

Thanks for your comments.

Well it is not out company policy but I think it is a "German VAT Law". I have just heard about this but am not really sure.

I would like to reach out to the SAP community to confirm if this is correct and if it is then we will have to keep the backup of data in Germany (since the SAP server is in some other country), so essentially the the same data will be duplicate at 2 places which is not very cost effective.

Thanks,

Vivek

[Former Member]

From global and regional systems I have been involved with, this was also the case.

There are also export controls on encryption software...

Cheers,

Julius

[Former Member]

Hi Julius,

Thanks for your response.

Can you please let me know in detail about your experience in this scenario.

1. How did you handle documnets that are physically stored in some other country but legally should be stored in Germany ?

2. Can you please explain about the second point "export controls on encryption software", how is it usefull in this scenario.

If you can send me any documents on this topic it will be very helpfull.

Thanks again,

Vivek

[Former Member]

> 1. How did you handle documnets that are physically stored in some other country but legally should be stored in Germany ?

You either mirror them, or give them their own instance to work on and mirror it back.

Another option is to use virtual companies, but in my experience that creates a mess and is not scalable (imagine all countries want this?).

> 2. Can you please explain about the second point "export controls on encryption software", how is it usefull in this scenario.

It was a thought. I did not say that it would be effectively usefull. Basically, the authorities want to be able to do a "morning raid" if required and confiscate / copy the disks for investigation. That is why they want the hardware physically within their legislative area...

You can use encryption, but the keys (probably lots of them...) will be within legislative area as well, probably.

You will need to contact your DB vendor about that.

Possibly you can also contact the authorities and ask for an exception.

Cheers,

Julius