What is false self-employment in the Netherlands?
False self-employment means the contract says self-employed, but the work is similar to a job. The Dutch word for it is schijnzelfstandigheid. The Belastingdienst tests the working relationship itself, not the label on the agreement.
This page shows how the Belastingdienst weighs whether your engagement holds up. It also sets out what follows if it does not. It does not weigh whether you should be self-employed at all. We explain that choice on our page about freelancing versus employment. It is also not the income-tax entrepreneur test, which asks whether you run a business at all. You can pass that test and still fail this one. We set out the difference on the entrepreneur test for income tax. It does not choose a legal form for you either. We cover that question on our page about a sole proprietorship or a private limited company (bv).
Take Sadia. She analyses claims data for a Dutch insurer and invoices as a freelancer. An agency placed her there. Her contract calls her a contractor. She works to the team rota and joins the same weekly review as the employees. She is on the internal on-call list too. Sadia's arrangement is the one we test.
The test itself follows below. It is often called the DBA test, after the Wet DBA, the law on assessing work relationships.
In short
The facts decide, not the contract. A title, an invoice and a signed agreement do not settle it. How the work is actually done does.
Three marks point to employment. The client's power to direct the work, work you must do in person and pay for doing it².
Authority weighs heaviest of the three. One yes to the four questions about direction already points toward employment².
Enforcement resumed on 1 January 2025. The Belastingdienst can correct an engagement and raise a payroll-tax assessment straight away¹.
Corrections reach back no further than 1 January 2025. Deliberate intent or an ignored instruction opens a five-year window instead¹.
Approved model agreements still apply. One whose approval was valid on 6 September 2024 keeps its status³. That status lasts until the end of 31 December 2029. It applies only while both sides work as the agreement describes³.
What does the Belastingdienst actually test?
It tests the working relationship, using every fact around it². Employment has three marks: the client can direct the work, you have to supply the work in person and the client pays you for it². Those three do not settle it on their own².
Everything around the engagement weighs as well². That includes the nature and duration of the work and how the hours are set². It also weighs how far you and the work are part of the client's organisation². The rest of the list is about money and risk². It looks at how the agreement came about, how your pay is set and how high it is². It looks at the commercial risk you carry and at whether you could send someone else in your place². Last, it looks at how far you actually behave as an entrepreneur².
Authority is the sharpest of the three marks. The Belastingdienst puts it to the client as four questions². Can the client decide how, when, where and with whom the person works? Can the client decide how many hours or days a week? If the person has to work with others, can the client step in? If the person does the same work as the client's own staff, can the client give the same instructions?
One yes is already a strong sign of an authority relationship². Read the four questions in one direction only. They are built to detect employment and they cannot prove the opposite.
Much of the advice circulating on this topic points the other way.
What can the Belastingdienst do about it now?
It can correct the engagement and raise a payroll-tax assessment straight away¹. So what changed? Until the end of 2024 a moratorium held enforcement back. That moratorium ended on 1 January 2025 and enforcement started again¹.
Since then the Belastingdienst no longer starts with a formal instruction to put the engagement right. The Dutch name for that instruction is an aanwijzing¹. Where it finds false self-employment it can require the client to repair the payroll records. That requirement is a correction obligation¹. It can raise a payroll-tax assessment at the same time¹.
A correction never reaches back past 1 January 2025¹. There are two exceptions: deliberate intent and an aanwijzing that was given but not followed. In those cases a correction can reach back up to five years¹.
Fines work differently again, which is where the position gets misread most often. The Belastingdienst imposes no fine without culpability in 2025 or 2026. It can impose the culpability fine from 1 January 2026¹.
| Item | Where it stands |
|---|---|
| Enforcement | Resumed on 1 January 2025. No instruction comes first¹. |
| Correction and assessment | The Belastingdienst can impose both on the client directly¹. |
| How far back | Never past 1 January 2025. Up to five years where there is deliberate intent or an ignored instruction¹. |
| Fine without culpabilityverzuimboete | None in 2025. None in 2026 either¹. |
| Culpability finevergrijpboete | Available since 1 January 2026, in cases of deliberate intent or gross negligence¹. |
Does a model agreement still protect you?
It protects you only where the work matches what it describes³. The Belastingdienst used to approve template contracts in advance. Those are the modelovereenkomsten³. One never covered more than the way of working written into it³.
Two things changed. The Belastingdienst assesses no new model agreements³. One whose approval was valid on 6 September 2024 stays valid until 31 December 2029 at the latest³. A different end date written into the agreement itself has no effect³.
Most problems start where the working week differs from the agreement.
“The contract is almost never the problem. The working week is. People sign something that describes a free hand, then spend two years inside someone else's rota. That gap is what we look at first, before anyone else does.”
Who pays if the arrangement does not hold?
The contractor loses deductions and the client pays the payroll-tax assessment¹. The diagnosis is identical for the two of you. Only the consequences split.
Are you the contractor?
The Belastingdienst corrects your income-tax position. The entrepreneur deductions fall away with it. That includes the zelfstandigenaftrek, the deduction for people who run their own business. It also includes the mkb-winstvrijstelling, which exempts part of your profit. Our self-employed deduction page lists the amounts.
Are you the client?
The engagement moves onto your payroll. The Belastingdienst can impose a correction obligation and a payroll-tax assessment covering wage tax and social-security contributions¹.
Back to Sadia. Her contract gives her a free hand and her week does not. The rota, the weekly review and the on-call list all point towards employment in the test². None of the three appears in what she signed.
That does not settle her case and nothing on a page can. It does mean that three of the things the test weighs point the same way. That is reason enough to put it to an advisor before the next invoice. The insurer she works for has the same reason to ask. Both of them have the same next step. With an agency in the chain, who pays the correction needs its own check.
What is changing in the law?
A legal presumption of employment is on its way, tied to the hourly rate⁴. What does that mean in practice? Once the Act takes effect, a worker below a set hourly rate could claim that the engagement is an employment contract⁴. The client would then have to show that it is not⁴.
The Act went through three parliamentary steps⁴. The Tweede Kamer (the lower house) passed the Act on 21 April 2026. The Eerste Kamer (the senate) followed on 16 June 2026. It appeared in the Staatsblad (the official law gazette) on 29 June 2026. It will take effect on a date set by royal decree, which can differ per part of the Act⁴.
As the Act stands the rate is €38 an hour⁴, with 1 January 2026 as the reference date. It is not a fixed statutory number. It would move every two years with the minimum wage⁴.
One more piece of the earlier plan is gone. An amendment on 10 March 2026 struck the clarifying half out of the bill⁴. That bill was the Wet verduidelijking beoordeling arbeidsrelaties, Vbar for short. It was meant to spell out how to judge these relationships. What remained became this Act⁴.
What does this mean for your own situation?
Compare your working week with your contract, line by line². Nothing in the coming law changes that first step. Where the two agree, the paper describes what actually happens. Where they pull apart, that gap is what the Belastingdienst looks at².
Three questions get you most of the way. Who decides your hours and your place of work? Could you send someone else in your place? Do you carry any commercial risk on this engagement²?
The Ministry of Social Affairs publishes the Webmodule Beoordeling Arbeidsrelatie, an online questionnaire for clients. The Belastingdienst publishes the Toelichting Beoordeling arbeidsrelaties, a guide to the same facts. Both exist in Dutch only, which is a real obstacle if Dutch is not your working language.
None of this produces a verdict. That is the honest answer here, not a hedge. The test depends on the facts of one engagement, so it takes someone who can look at yours. An arrangement that does not hold often leaves other gaps as well. Sick pay, cover for long-term illness and pension build-up are the usual three. They belong in the same conversation. For Sadia that conversation starts with her rota, not her contract.
What we do for business owners is on our page about tax advice for entrepreneurs.
¹ belastingdienst.nl, Arbeidsrelaties en handhaving · Accessed
² belastingdienst.nl, Wanneer is er sprake van loondienst? · Accessed
³ belastingdienst.nl, Geen nieuwe modelovereenkomsten meer · Accessed
⁴ eerstekamer.nl, Wet invoering rechtsvermoeden van arbeidsovereenkomst op basis van uurtarief · Accessed
Common questions about false self-employment in the Netherlands
Does working through an agency change the test?
No, the test looks at the working relationship itself². That holds whoever stands between you and the organisation you work for. Who pays a correction in a chain like that is a question for an advisor.
Can I be fined for this myself?
Only the client, where there is deliberate intent or gross negligence¹. That is the culpability fine. It first became available on 1 January 2026, not before¹. There were no default fines in 2025 and there are none in 2026 either¹. The client pays the payroll taxes themselves, not you¹.
How far back can the Belastingdienst go?
Not past 1 January 2025 in the normal case¹. Two things change that. Deliberate intent opens a five-year window instead¹. So does an aanwijzing the client was given and did not follow¹.
What do I lose as the contractor?
You lose the entrepreneur deductions and the Belastingdienst recalculates your income tax. The zelfstandigenaftrek and the mkb-winstvrijstelling are the two that carry the most weight. Our page on the self-employed deduction lists what they are worth per year.
Does my residence permit depend on this?
That falls outside the tax test and outside this page. Raise it in the conversation all the same, because the arrangement and the permit can be linked. Ask the IND (the Dutch immigration service) or an immigration lawyer whether your permit allows this kind of work.
What should I bring to the call?
Your contract, your invoices and an honest description of your week. The description does the most work, because that is what the test weighs². If someone with a payroll number does the same job in the same team, say so.