BR-55 warning EN 16931
BR-55 — credit note doesn't reference the original invoice
What it means
A credit note or corrected invoice (type 381/384) should reference the invoice it corrects (BG-3, the preceding invoice reference). It ties the correction to the original so both sides’ bookkeeping stays consistent.
What triggers it
typeCode is 381 (credit note) or 384 (corrected invoice) and precedingInvoiceReference is empty.
How to fix it
Reference the original invoice number (and issue date if you have it):
{ "typeCode": "381", "precedingInvoiceReference": [ { "id": "INV-2026-0042" } ] } This is a warning, not a hard error — but leaving it out makes reconciliation harder for the buyer and is often required in practice.
Check your invoice now. Paste it into the free validator — it flags BR-55 and every other EN 16931, Peppol and XRechnung rule, each with the fix.
Or run the same check via API:
curl -X POST https://fakturwire.com/v1/validate \
-H "authorization: Bearer $FW_KEY" \
-d '{"invoice": { ... }, "profile": "en16931"}'