Important: Only users with the Admin or Sales role can configure DATEV exports or download them.
Before you start
Ask your accountant for your chart of accounts (Kontenrahmen). You need the GL account numbers for rental revenue, insurance, deposits and anything else you invoice.
Kinnovis does not check these numbers against SKR03, SKR04 or any other account plan. Whatever you enter is what appears in the file, so it is worth confirming the numbers with your accountant before the first real export.
Configure the export
Step 1: Open the DATEV export settings
Go to the invoice list view. Click the action button and choose Configure DATEV export.
The DATEV Export screen opens with a standard configuration already applied. Ten of the 124 DATEV columns are mapped, default contra-account rules are in place as editable placeholders and the export scope is set to sensible defaults. Nothing here is fixed. You can change any part of it and reset back to the standard configuration at any time.
Important: Configuration and download are separate actions. Once your settings are saved you never have to open this screen again to get a file.
Step 2: Check the configuration and its locations
Two fields sit at the top of the screen, above the tabs.
Configuration is the set of settings you are editing. You start with DATEV Standard configuration.
Applies to is the list of locations the configuration covers. Most operators run one configuration across every location.
Create a second one when the column mapping or the scope genuinely differs between sites, for example in a franchise setup where one group is a separate accounting entity. If the only difference is the GL account numbers, keep one configuration and use per-location contra-account rules instead (see Step 5).
Step 3: Set the scope and file format
Open the Scope and format tab. This decides which rows end up in the file and how the file itself is written.
What goes into the export
Invoice filter — All invoices or Paid only. Default: all invoices
File organization — One combined file or One file per location
Exclude invoices marked as paid manually — off by default. Turn it on to skip invoices that were settled manually in the Kinnovis Manager
Exclude line items with a zero amount — on by default. Rows with a final amount of 0 are skipped. On credit notes the amount is checked after the discount has been subtracted
Include credit notes — on by default. Credit notes are exported with the "H" indicator and their matching contra-account
Include payment rows — off by default. Turn it on if your accountant reconciles payments against invoices in DATEV. Cash and non-cash payments are distinguished and can be mapped to different accounts
Include separate discount rows — off by default. Turn it on if discounts need their own booking lines against their own revenue accounts, for example 8790 for taxed and 8770 for untaxed
Include voided invoices — off by default. Voided invoices get separate rows when this is on
Include refunds — off by default. Refunded payments are added as separate entries
One row in the file represents one invoice, credit note or payment line item.
File settings
Include header row — on by default. Adds the DATEV column names, such as "Umsatz" and "Soll/Haben-Kennzeichen", as the first row
Include DATEV header — off by default. Adds the EXTF header row required to import the file into DATEV. Your accountant will tell you whether they need it
Character encoding — UTF-8 or Windows-1252
Line endings — LF or CRLF
Encoding and line endings are dictated by whatever your accountant's system expects. If nobody has told you otherwise, leave them as they are.
Step 4: Review the column mapping
Open the Column mapping tab. This controls what value goes into each of the 124 DATEV Buchungsstapel columns.
Most operators populate only eight to eleven of them and leave the rest blank. Those common columns are highlighted and already mapped for you:
DATEV column | Typical value |
Umsatz (ohne Soll/Haben-Kz) | Gross Amount |
Soll/Haben-Kennzeichen | Debit/Credit Indicator |
WKZ Umsatz | Fixed text: "EUR" |
Konto | Accounts Receivable Number or Customer ID |
Gegenkonto (ohne BU-Schlüssel) | Contra-Account (rule-based) |
Belegdatum | Document Date (DDMM) |
Belegfeld 1 | Invoice/Credit Note Number |
Buchungstext | Customer Display Name |
KOST1 - Kostenstelle | Fixed text, for example "1002" |
Festschreibung | Fixed number: 0 |
To populate a column that is not shown, search for it by name and add a mapping.
How a column gets its value
Each column can be set to one of the following:
A single dynamic field. Either a system value, resolved per row when the export runs, or a configuration value you set once
A concatenation. Several fields joined together with static text between them
Empty. The column is left blank in the file
Building a concatenated value
Concatenation is how you get booking texts your accountant can read at a glance. For Buchungstext, combining the customer name with the booking period:
Customer Display Name + "; " + Booking Start Date + " - " + Booking End Date
produces:
Müller GmbH; 01.01.2025 - 31.01.2025
The same approach works anywhere. For Beleginfo - Inhalt 2, "Rechnung: " + Invoice/Credit Note Number gives you Rechnung: RE-2025-001234.
Fallback values
Any mapping can take a fallback, used whenever the main value comes back empty. Setting Konto to Accounts Receivable Number with a fallback of Customer ID means customers without an AR number still get a valid account. A fallback can be any field, any fixed value or another concatenation, and fallbacks can be chained.
Step 5: Set your contra-account rules
Open the Contra-account rules tab. This is the section most operators spend their time in. A contra-account rule tells the export which GL number to book a line item against.
Each rule has:
Product type — rental (unit type), insurance, deposit, other product, or a fallback that catches anything unmatched
Tax condition — a specific tax class, or any
Product name — an optional condition that matches the start of the product name, useful if your products are not cleanly categorised. A rule set to "Vorhängeschloss" matches "Vorhängeschloss XYZ"
GL account number — the contra-account to book against
Rules are evaluated in order and the first match wins, so put your most specific rules at the top.
Different accounts per location
If your accountant uses a different revenue account for each site, for example 810400 for Berlin and 810100 for Munich, define the rules per location rather than creating a separate configuration.
Fallbacks
Every rule set takes a fallback account. If a line item matches no rule, it lands in the fallback rather than leaving the column blank. Unmapped items stay visible in your accounts instead of quietly going missing.
Payment, discount and voided invoice accounts
Each row type you switched on in Step 3 gets its own mapping here. Payments are split into cash and non-cash, discounts into taxed and untaxed.
Step 6: Set up a sending schedule (optional)
Open the Schedule tab. Rather than downloading the file yourself each month, you can have it sent by email.
Choose monthly and set an anchor date, from the 1st through to the last day of the month. Or choose weekly or fortnightly and set the day it goes out.
Add the recipients: your own inbox, your accountant's inbox, or both.
Step 7: Check the preview, then save
The Live preview panel on the right builds a sample file from your mapping as you work. Use it to catch problems before your accountant does.
Switch between Table and Raw CSV to see the formatted columns or the file exactly as it will be written
Set the Preview period to check a specific month
The footer tells you how many booking entries the period produced and how many of the 124 columns are mapped
Check that the accounts, amounts and booking texts look the way your accountant expects, then click Save and close.
It is worth sending that preview to your accountant before you rely on the export for a real month end.
Sending/downloading an export
Your saved configuration is used every time, so sending it takes a few seconds.
Go to the invoice list view
Click the action button and choose Send DATEV export
Confirm the configuration. Your default configuration is already selected
Choose the period. Pick one of the last three months, or set a custom date range. Last month is selected by default
Click "Send export"
You get a single CSV file, or a zip archive if your configuration produces one file per location.
Notes to keep in mind
What happens to the export you currently receive by email
If Kinnovis sends you a DATEV file today, that keeps running while you set this up. Once you have configured the export yourself and confirmed the output is correct, the email version is switched off. Nothing changes at your end until you say so.
Small differences from your current file
The file you configure here is generated fresh rather than copied from the old setup, so a few details differ. Amounts are written without thousand separators and always with two decimals, for example "1234,56". Voided invoices are excluded by default, whereas the older export included them. Compare one month side by side before you switch over.
Account numbers are not validated
Kinnovis does not check GL numbers against DATEV account plans. A typo in a rule produces a file that looks correct but books to the wrong account.
What this export does not cover
The accounts file (Debitoren) is not part of this export
There is no direct connection to DATEV's cloud platform. This produces a CSV file for you or your accountant to upload
The export is not available through Kinnovis Connect
The existing BMD export is unchanged and sits alongside the DATEV options in the same action button