What is Peppol?
Peppol (originally "Pan-European Public Procurement OnLine") is an international network with open standards for exchanging business documents — especially electronic invoices and credit notes — in a structured and secure way between businesses and governments. Instead of emailing a PDF, your software sends a machine-readable document (UBL/XML) directly to your customer's accounting software, over a controlled and standardized network.
The network is managed by OpenPeppol, a non-profit association headquartered in Belgium, and is used in more than 40 countries. You connect to a certified access point just once, and can then exchange with every other participant on the network ("connect once, reach all"). Your own software only talks to your own access point — the two access points handle the rest between themselves.
Important for Belgian clubs: from 1 January 2026, sending and receiving structured e-invoices via Peppol becomes mandatory for domestic B2B transactions between Belgian VAT-registered businesses (law of 6 February 2024). A regular PDF or paper invoice will no longer suffice for those transactions. Invoices to private individuals (B2C) fall outside this obligation. The mandatory format in Belgium is Peppol BIS Billing 3.0 (UBL 2.1), which follows the European standard EN 16931.
What can Peppol do for my club?
Club Planner has a built-in Peppol integration for sending your invoices. Once your club is registered as a Peppol sender, you can push the following documents directly over the Peppol network to your business customers from within Club Planner:
| Document type | Via Peppol |
|---|---|
| Sales invoice | Yes |
| Credit note | Yes |
| Self-billing (invoicing on behalf of the customer) | Yes |
What this concretely gets you:
- Less manual work and fewer errors — the invoice arrives in structured form at your customer, without any retyping.
- Faster processing and payment — the invoice lands straight into the recipient's software.
- Ready for the 2026 obligation — you send in the correct format (Peppol BIS Billing 3.0 / EN 16931).
- Automatic check beforehand — before every send, Club Planner checks live whether your customer is reachable on Peppol. If the customer is not registered, the system reports this and nothing is sent.
- Status tracking per invoice — for each invoice you see the Peppol status (created, sent, accepted or error) and you can refresh it.
An honest note: the Club Planner integration handles the sending of your invoices via Peppol. Receiving incoming e-invoices does not go through Club Planner — for that you use your accounting or ERP software that supports Peppol. Keep this in mind, because from 2026 onwards you, as a B2B business, must also be able to receive e-invoices.
How do I set up Peppol?
The setup consists of two layers. The technical connection to the Peppol network (the certified access point via Wolters Kluwer Flowin, with certificate and login credentials) is set up centrally, once, by Club Planner and is shared by all clubs. You don't need to install anything for that yourself. What you do as a club owner is done entirely yourself from within the app.
Step-by-step in the Core web app (menu Settings > Company Details):
- Complete your company profile fully. Make sure these fields are correct — they are sent to Peppol as your sender details:
- Company name
- Company/VAT number with the correct country selected
- Address: street + number, postal code, town
- Email address
- IBAN
- Register your club as a Peppol sender. Click the "Create company Peppol" button. Club Planner saves your profile and registers your club as a sender on the network. On success, your club is a registered Peppol sender.
- Send your invoices. Go to POS > Invoices and, on an invoice, use the "Send via Peppol" action. There is also a bulk action to send multiple invoices together. Club Planner first checks whether the invoice is valid and whether your customer is reachable on Peppol, and then sends it.
Working in the desktop app (Club Planner.exe)? Then you'll find the same button on the Company Profile screen. After a successful registration, a checkmark appears next to the button and your VAT field is locked. The Maintain Invoice screen shows a Peppol status field with the same send and refresh actions.
Conditions for being able to send:
| Condition | Who handles this |
|---|---|
| Complete company profile (number, country, address, email, IBAN) | You (club owner) |
| Club registered as a Peppol sender ("Create company Peppol") | You (club owner) |
| Employee right "Settings allowed" to perform the registration | You (club owner) |
| Customer is themselves a registered Peppol participant | Your customer |
| Connection to the Peppol access point (Flowin certificate) | Club Planner (central) |
What if your customer isn't on Peppol yet? Then you get the message "Customer not registered in Peppol" and the invoice is not sent. Your customer must then first register on the Peppol network (via their own accounting software or service provider). Club Planner automatically looks up your customer by their VAT number (scheme 9925) or company number (scheme 0208 for Belgium), so if the customer is registered, the correct identification usually works out on its own.
Don't see the Peppol button, or does a send fail with a certificate or registration error? Then get in touch with Club Planner support — availability depends on your app version and the central network connection, which we manage.