# BR-DE-5 Seller contact point must be provided

In XRechnung, whenever the seller contact group (BG-6) is present, the seller contact point or person name (BT-41) must be populated. Public administration accounting offices in Germany use this field to identify which organizational unit (e.g. "Buchhaltung", "Vertrieb", "Kundenservice") or individual contact person is responsible for answering invoice content queries and resolving performance verification issues.

## Problem Description

> **ERROR**: German XRechnung rule (KoSIT, BR-DE) · XRechnung 3.0

> **Where BR-DE-5 is checked**
>
> A validator checks an e-invoice in stages. First the file must be well-formed XML that matches the UBL or CII schema (XSD). Then the EN 16931 business rules run: BR core rules, BR-CO calculations, BR-CL code lists, BR-DEC decimals and VAT-category rules such as BR-S. Next come the national or network rules that BT-24 selects: BR-DE for XRechnung, PEPPOL-EN16931 for Peppol BIS Billing. The report lists every failed rule: one error means reject, warnings alone still mean accept. BR-DE-5: XRechnung rule (Germany), reported in the stage “National rules (CIUS)”.

## Context and Significance

BT-41 operates in tandem with BT-42 (phone) and BT-43 (email). If any of these three fields is missing from BG-6, the XRechnung Schematron validation engine flags an error.

## Solution

In your billing software, enter a contact department or person name in the seller profile. In UBL 2.1 syntax, populate <cbc:Name> inside <cac:AccountingSupplierParty><cac:Party><cac:Contact>. In UN/CEFACT CII syntax, populate <ram:PersonName> or <ram:DepartmentName> inside <ram:SellerTradeParty><ram:DefinedTradeContact>. Do not leave the element empty or populate it with whitespace only.

- [Validate XML](/en/xrechnung-validator?source=resource&rule=BR-DE-5)
- [Convert invoice](/en/pdf-to-xrechnung?source=resource&rule=BR-DE-5)

## Valid Examples

- BT-41 = "Finanzbuchhaltung / Rechnungsabteilung"
- BT-41 = "Dr. Johannes Weber (Projektleitung)"

## Invalid Examples

- Seller contact group (cac:Contact / ram:DefinedTradeContact) contains telephone and email but completely omits cbc:Name / ram:PersonName
- Contact name element contains empty string or whitespace only (<cbc:Name></cbc:Name>)

## Code Examples

### Valid XML
```
<cac:Contact>
  <cbc:Name>Zentrale Rechnungsprüfung</cbc:Name>
  <cbc:Telephone>+49 30 1234567</cbc:Telephone>
  <cbc:ElectronicMail>rechnung@lieferant.de</cbc:ElectronicMail>
</cac:Contact>
```

### Invalid XML
```
<cac:Contact>
  <cbc:Telephone>+49 30 1234567</cbc:Telephone>
  <cbc:ElectronicMail>rechnung@lieferant.de</cbc:ElectronicMail>
</cac:Contact>
```

## Affected Fields

- [BT-41 Seller contact point](/resources/xrechnung/bt-41-seller-contact-point)
- [BG-6 Seller contact](/resources/xrechnung/bt-41-seller-contact-point)
- [BT-42 Seller contact telephone number](/resources/xrechnung/bt-42-seller-contact-telephone-number)
- [BT-43 Seller contact email address](/resources/xrechnung/bt-43-seller-contact-email-address)

## Related Rules

- [BR-DE-2](/resources/kosit-validator-errors/br-de-2-seller-contact-required)
- [BR-DE-6](/resources/kosit-validator-errors/br-de-6-seller-contact-telephone-required)
- [BR-DE-7](/resources/kosit-validator-errors/br-de-7-seller-contact-email-required)

## Validation Tools

- [Official KoSIT Validator](https://github.com/itplr-kosit/validator): Run the official KoSIT validator with the XRechnung configuration to check EN 16931 and XRechnung rules.
- [Convert PDF to XRechnung](/pdf-to-xrechnung): Find validation errors during conversion and review each correction.

## Related Resources

- [Official Specification](https://xeinkauf.de/xrechnung/)
- [Test Suite](https://github.com/itplr-kosit/xrechnung-testsuite)
- [All validation errors](/resources/kosit-validator-errors): Overview of the EN 16931, XRechnung and Peppol validation rules explained here.