Google Workspace Email Archiving for GoBD

GoBD are the German tax authority's rules for keeping electronic books and records. Many young companies and agencies run on Gmail, and the retention duty under § 257 HGB (Commercial Code) and § 147 AO (Fiscal Code) applies regardless of the mail system.

Legal basis

• § 257 HGB and § 147 AO: 6 years for business letters (Handelsbriefe), 8 years for accounting vouchers including invoices, 10 years for books, annual financial statements and organisational documents. Since 1 January 2025 (Fourth Bureaucracy Relief Act, BEG IV) invoices and other vouchers are kept for 8 instead of 10 years. This applies to all documents whose old 10-year period had not ended by 31 December 2024 (Art. 97 § 19a EGAO). Banks, insurers and investment firms follow one year later.
• Start of the period: the end of the calendar year in which the document was created or received.
• BFH order XI R 15/23 (30 April 2025): emails can be business letters.
• § 146 (2a) AO: electronic records may be kept in another EU member state.

The problem

In Gmail, users can delete emails, and the trash empties after 30 days. Nothing in the mailbox guarantees that a business letter or an invoice is still there after six or eight years. GoBD expects complete, unalterable and readable records, which a mailbox does not provide.

How to archive Google Workspace with EasyMailArchive

Step 1: Account and relay address

Sign up for the 30-day free trial, no credit card. Under Admin > Integrations you find your relay address:

[email protected]

Step 2: Routing rule in the Admin console

1. Open the Google Admin console.
2. Go to Apps > Google Workspace > Gmail > Routing.
3. Click Add another rule.
4. Name it "EasyMailArchive".
5. Under affected messages, select inbound, outbound and internal.
6. Under additional recipients, enter your relay address.
7. Save.

Step 3: Test

After a short while, send one email internally and one externally, then search for both in EasyMailArchive. Details are in the setup guide.

Step 4: Import existing mail

The routing rule captures email from the moment it is active. Bring in older mail through the Google Workspace connection, which needs a service account with domain-wide delegation. Alternatively, connect single mailboxes over IMAP, see IMAP integrations. Duplicates are detected. Imported mail counts its retention from its own date.

Step 5: Retention and sign-in

• Set retention rules per organisation, domain or mailbox, up to 10 years on Starter and Business. Retention runs in whole years to 31 December of the year.
• There is no delete function for single emails. Mail is deleted only automatically when retention ends.
• Set up single sign-on with your Google account (OIDC). TOTP two-factor authentication is available.
• Optional: legal hold for ongoing disputes (Business and up).

All data is encrypted with AES-256 and a separate key per customer, with TLS in transit, a separate database per customer and hosting in a data centre in Germany. For an audit you export original EML or PDF with SHA-256 checksums, digitally signed on Business and up. Every action is logged and the log exports as CSV. There is no official GoBD certification for software, so you also document your process in writing. For data processing terms see the data processing agreement.

Google Vault compared with EasyMailArchive

Read more

• GoBD email archiving
• Audit-proof email archiving
• Who must archive email in Germany
• Email archive in the cloud, hosted in Germany
• Archiving Microsoft 365 email

See pricing or try it free for 30 days.

This article summarises the law in general terms and is not legal or tax advice.