Ground Control Agency is already Peppol compliant—without buying more software

Quentin Van Damme is an events, music, and media professional based in Antwerp, Belgium. Besides the other hats he wears, he owns and operates an artist booking and management company called Ground Control Agency (GCA) along with his business partner, Bjorn Wendelen (AKA the world-famous DJ Ghost).

Quentin lists four languages that he’s highly proficient in: English, Dutch, French, and Music!

GCA is a boutique agency founded 10 years ago as a spin-off from Pilot agency, and represents a roster of around 40 artists. It mainly focuses on dance and EDM DJs, and prides itself on having "the biggest retro roster of the country," Quentin says. They also represent a few live acts and techno artists.

Quentin believes that being highly active in the music industry gives the GCA team a slight advantage.

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While they’re not the biggest agency in terms of size or representation, they aim to be "one of the coolest... or one of the chillest.”

But staying "chill" when navigating the elaborate music industry—especially the administrative shift to mandatory digital invoicing—requires the right tools.

Solving mandatory Peppol compliance at GCA

Digital invoicing (eInvoicing) is becoming a major theme across Europe. From 1 January 2026, businesses in Belgium must send their invoices digitally over a shared network called Peppol.

For agency owners like Quentin, this new government mandate initially felt like a looming administrative nightmare. He jokingly describes Peppol as "the spy game of the government" to regulate all businesses’ income and expenses to prevent tax avoidance.

While he understands the necessity of Peppol and the good it can do, the practical application at GCA was a source of some anxiety, as it seemed to spell out: OPERATIONAL FRICTION.

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Agency workflows are already dense with booking requests, contract generation, negotiation, payment tracking, and follow-ups. Quentin worried that Peppol would be "just another task to add to that list," potentially complicating their existing invoicing process and requiring manual oversight that a lean, two-person agency simply doesn’t have enough resources for.

Frictionless eInvoicing with SystemOne

Quentin has been relying on SystemOne for 13+ years to manage bookings, schedules, and logistics. When it came to Peppol, SystemOne integrated the compliance features directly into the existing interface in what we call InvoiceV2.

Baked-in Peppol compliance

For Quentin, the transition to Peppol compliance was invisible.

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Instead of procuring a new invoicing software or manually uploading invoices to the government portal, GCA’s workflow remained intact—the same as sending an invoice email.

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Automating admin beyond Peppol

SystemOne empowers GCA to operate efficiently despite the partners living in different countries—Quentin in Belgium and Bjorn in Spain. "We call each other every day, but we don't see each other often, and yet we manage to work seamlessly," Quentin says.

Our platform handles the heavy lifting of chasing signatures and payments. Quentin has configured SystemOne to send automatic reminders after 7, 14, and 21 days.

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This automation saves the agency at least half an administrative assistant’s salary.

Work at the office, anywhere

As an event producer and stage manager, Quentin is rarely sitting at a desk. Sometimes he processes bookings from behind festival stages—all he needs to run his agency is wifi, his laptop, and SystemOne.

This mobility extends to the artists, who rely heavily on the SystemOne mobile app to make sure everything runs according to schedule. It gives them direct access to their flights, trains, boarding passes, etc. The mobile app is free and available offline.

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SystemOne has turned administrative hurdles into opportunities for GCA, and can do the same for your booking agency.