The accounting reform that comes into force on 1ᵉʳ January 2025 is not just a technical update of the general chart of accounts. It will profoundly transform the day-to-day practices of companies, in particular the management of expense claims, an area that is still all too often a source of errors, wasted time… and non-compliance.
By recasting accounts, clarifying rebilling rules and requiring more detailed recording, the new standards require a complete reorganisation of workflows relating to business expenses. Here’s what this means – in concrete terms – for businesses.
1. More detailed and structured accounting
The new version of the chart of accounts introduces a more precise classification of management expenses. For expense accounts, this means that account 625 has been split into several specific sub-accounts :
- 6251 – Travel
- 6256 – Missions
- 6257 – Receptions, etc.
👉 Impact : Software must enable automatic and intuitive categorisation as soon as the expense is entered. Employees can no longer simply declare an ‘expense claim’, they must assign it to the right sub-nature to guarantee accounting reliability.
2. Stricter rules for amounts > €500
The reform requires all transactions over €500 to be recorded in detail, including :
- A valid receipt
- The correct charge account debited
- Supplier account credited (401)
- Correct VAT management (44566)
👉 Impact : It’s impossible to manage this manually without increasing the number of errors. You need a tool that automates the generation of compliant entries, with attached supporting documents and direct accounting integration.
3. 2025 rebilling : account 708 becomes the new standard
In 2025, the re-invoicing of costs to a customer will have to go through account 708, which corresponds to income from ancillary activities. This new requirement prohibits the accounting tinkering previously used to ‘neutralise’ costs.
👉 Impact : Software must incorporate a compliant rebilling function that clearly distinguishes what is billed, to whom, and according to what accounting logic. This is also an issue for the legibility of the income statement.
4. Digital storage of supporting documents : simpler, but more demanding
The reform makes it possible to digitise expense claim receipts in full, provided that they have evidential value (inalterability, traceability, etc.).
👉 Impact : Companies need to abandon paper files and ensure that their solution is certified for tax archiving (NF203, digital safe, etc.). A scan is no longer enough.
5. The key role of accounting automation
With the proliferation of constraints (sub-accounts, thresholds, VAT, rebilling, archiving), manual processing of expense claims is becoming an error trap.
👉 Impact : Companies must equip themselves with solutions capable of :
- Automatically read receipts (OCR + AI)
- Identifying the right accounting category
- Calculating and integrating deductible VAT
- Generate entries ready for accounting export
- Ensure the traceability of each expense
What will change for businesses in 2025 ?
| BEFORE 2025 | AFTER 2025 |
|---|---|
| Unclear categorisation of costs | Specific allocation (6251, 6256, etc.) |
| Cobbled-together rebilling | Mandatory use of account 708 |
| Non-standard paper or PDF supporting documents | Digital archiving with evidential value |
| Frequent manual treatment | Automation and native export to the accounting system |
| Few tax audits on expenses | Tighter controls on business expenses |
In a nutshell : expense management is becoming a strategic issue
Far from being a simple technical adjustment, the 2025 reform is forcing a structural transformation in the management of professional expenses. It requires companies to :
✅ Digitise 100% of their processes
✅ Automate accounting processing and export
✅ Ensure the reliability of every record as soon as it is entered
✅ Secure archiving in the event of a tax audit
Clearly, managing expense claims is no longer an administrative task : it’s a lever for compliance, performance and savings.
