ERP Implementation Consultant, France

Common failure points in French ERP rollouts

Most of the problems I see in French implementations trace back to work that sat between the integrator's scope and the client's attention:

• Open items migrated as single balances, so customer accounts can no longer be lettered against the invoices behind them.
• A chart of accounts redesigned for group reporting without checking that the French statutory view still works for the expert-comptable.
• Invoice exchange with the e-invoicing platform tested only on clean examples, never with credit notes, rejections or invoices carrying several VAT rates.
• Payroll journals from the payroll provider posted to accounts that no longer exist in the new chart.
• French invoice layouts, including the legal mentions your accountant specifies, finished at the last minute.

All five can be avoided when someone owns them and tests them early. My role is to make sure someone on your side owns them from the first week rather than discovering them during go-live. The underlying approach is set out under ERP implementation; what follows is how it plays out with a French integrator and a French finance team.

Overseeing the integrator from the client side

In France the integrator usually leads the method, the workshops and the build. That is how it should be. What is often missing is a counterpart who reads the design documents carefully and makes sure each one reflects what your teams actually need. I review each document against your requirements, prepare process owners before workshops so they arrive ready to decide, and record every decision with the reason and the person who took it.

Change requests go through one log: business reason, integrator estimate, impact on dates and budget, approval by the sponsor. When an estimate looks like work already included in a fixed-price package, I ask for the basis in writing. When a request is genuinely new, I help leadership decide whether it belongs in this phase or a later one.

Weekly working sessions with the integrator's project manager keep blockers visible, and a short steering meeting with your management covers decisions that need their authority. If relations have already deteriorated, the page on fixing a failing ERP implementation explains where I start.

Migrating from Sage, Cegid, EBP and older setups

Most French migrations start from an established package, often Sage, Cegid or EBP for accounting and sales, sometimes with a separate production or stock tool and a collection of spreadsheets. In other cases the expert-comptable keeps the ledger in their own software and the company only handles invoicing. Each starting point changes what has to move.

I help agree a migration plan with the integrator and your accountant: which master data moves and how it is cleaned, whether open customer and supplier items come across individually so lettrage continues, how opening balances are loaded and from which ledger, and how much history stays readable in the old system. Retention of old accounting records, and the ability to produce an FEC for past periods, are discussed with your accountant before the old system is switched off.

Your finance lead signs a reconciliation after every trial load: balances by account, open items by customer and supplier, stock by site. Duplicate third parties, missing SIREN or VAT numbers and items with no cost are fixed in the source during the trials. My ERP data migration page describes the method in more detail.

Testing the FEC, VAT and invoice exchange before go-live

French go-lives are judged in the first weeks by accounting and invoicing, so testing has to cover both properly. The plan I build with the integrator includes:

• An FEC export for a trial period, opened and checked by your expert-comptable, including journal codes, entry numbering and lettrage fields.
• VAT scenarios for goods and services, intra-EU sales and VAT due on receipts, compared with a return prepared the old way.
• Invoices sent through your e-invoicing platform and received from it, including credit notes, rejections and status messages.
• Invoices to public-sector customers where you serve them.
• Protection of posted entries, period closing and the rules for reopening.

Whether the results satisfy French requirements is for your accountant to confirm, as is the point at which your e-invoicing obligations begin. What I own is making sure the tests run with real cases and that the evidence is in front of the right people before anyone signs off. The test strategy and UAT approach are covered under ERP testing and UAT.

Go-live, payroll journals and hypercare

Payroll in France is usually run by a payroll provider or the accounting firm, and the ERP receives journals. I make sure the journal format, account mapping and analytical split are tested on a trial period, and that someone is named to check the first live posting.

The go-live point is chosen with your accountant in mind: switching at a period start keeps VAT returns and the FEC tidy, whereas changing over partway through a period leaves two ledgers contributing to one declaration. User training in French is delivered by key users or the integrator; I check that every role going live has a guide and has practiced on test data.

After the switch, hypercare runs remotely: a brief call each day with your key users and the integrator's consultants, one issue log, and priorities set so anything blocking invoicing, deliveries or payments is handled first. Hypercare closes once a full month-end and a VAT return have been produced in the new ERP. The checklist I use is on ERP go-live support. The decision that precedes delivery is covered under ERP selection in France, and my France page gives the wider picture.