The guide shelf
Our free guides on filing, on owning a home and on inheritance tax. Each one arrives by email once you ask for it.
Free guides, checklists and the returns explained
Guides you can download, checklists you can work through and the Dutch tax returns explained one by one. Every card says what it is, so you can tell before you open it.
Written by
Menno van der MadeHead of Tax - Tax Consultant
Reviewed by
Jessy te PaskeHead of Client Success
Updated 3 September 2026
Orientation
What we publish free, and what it is for
We publish free material you can use on your own. Guides to download and checklists to work through. Each Dutch tax return explained, one form at a time. And the rules themselves, for when you would rather look them up.
All of it is edited to the standard on our editorial guidelines page. Each page shows the date of its last review at the top.
Just arrived in the Netherlands? Start with the M-form below, because your first Dutch return is different. The Belastingdienst (the Dutch tax authority) issues the returns. Our pages help you work out which one applies to you.
None of it is advice about your own situation.
This page points you to the material. It does not explain the rules itself. For the rules, go to the Dutch tax system, our much larger explanatory section.
Guides and checklists
Something to keep, and something to work through
These four pages give you something you can keep using. The guide shelf holds our free guides, sent to you by email.
If your year has an unusual twist, a conversation will help you more than a checklist.
Inheritance tax checklist
What the Belastingdienst asks for when an estate is declared, in the order it asks for it.
Starting a business
The tax side of starting your own business. What you register, what you owe and your first deadlines.
Alimony and tax
Which alimony payments are deductible, which count as income and what you need to be able to show.
The forms
The Dutch returns, with the explanation beside each one
The Belastingdienst names each return by a letter, and the letters can be confusing. The four pages below show when each return applies and what it asks for.
The forms are drawn up by the Belastingdienst, not by us. Each page links to the official form once you know which one is yours.
M-form
The return for the year you moved to or left the Netherlands. You lived here for only part of that year, so the form covers both periods.
P-form
The ordinary annual return, for a year you spent living in the Netherlands from start to finish.
C-form
The return for a year you lived abroad but still had Dutch income or property.
F-form
The return filed on behalf of someone who died during the tax year, usually by the family.
Do it yourself
When you would rather look it up or work it out
The two pages below show you the rules and the calculations, not a ready answer. The first explains how the Dutch tax system works. The second shows how fiscal partners divide shared items between them. Most couples simply keep the default allocation.
Neither page is a download. You can use both without contacting us.
The Dutch tax system
The rules behind everything above. Learn how the three income boxes work and who counts as your fiscal partner.
Splitting items with your partner
How the allocation between fiscal partners works and what changes when you adjust the default.
Replies within one working day
“The material here is written for a situation rather than for a person. That works until your year has something unusual in it. When it does, ask, and I will tell you honestly whether a page still covers you.”
Menno van der Made
Tax advisor
Writes for this sectionVideo call or phone
Ask us
Cannot find what you need?
If you were looking for something and it is not on this page, tell Menno what it was. He writes a good deal of this material. So he either knows where it is or knows that it does not exist yet, and both are useful answers.
Frequently asked
Questions about the free material
What people ask before they download anything. Yours not here? Ask Menno
Do I have to give you my email address?
Only for the guides. The shelf sends its files by email, so that one asks for an address. The checklists, the form pages and the explanations are ordinary pages and ask nothing of you.
It is free, so what is the catch?
There is no catch, but there is a limit: all of it is general. Every page is written for a case rather than for your case. Where your year has a move, a sale or a foreign component in it, a page cannot know that. It will not tell you so either.
How current is this material?
Current enough that the review date is printed on it, and you can judge for yourself. Where something changes each year, the page says which year it is describing rather than leaving you to guess. Our editorial standards set out what we do when we find one that has gone out of date.
Can I use this instead of hiring an advisor?
Often, and that is rather the point. A straightforward year with one employer and one home is something a good many people file themselves after reading. It is the years with a move, a sale or income from another country in them where a page stops being enough.
Why are the forms explained here but hosted somewhere else?
Because the Belastingdienst owns them, and we would rather link than copy. A copy goes out of date the moment the form changes, and you would have no way of telling. Our pages explain which return is yours and what it asks for, then send you to the source for the form itself.
Missing something?
Tell us what you were looking for
A fair number of these pages exist because somebody asked for them first.
What's included
A reply from the person who writes this material
No obligation to become a client