Working remotely abroad for your Dutch employer

If you are employed by a Dutch company and want to keep working on the road, your employer has to say yes first. You have no right to work from abroad. If the answer is yes, the two of you arrange three things: who taxes your wages, where you are insured, and which papers go with it. Within the EU you often stay insured in the Netherlands, with an A1 certificate. Outside the EU a lot depends on how long you go away for.

Three things to know up front:

• Your employer only has to consider your request. He may turn it down.
• As long as the Netherlands may tax your wages, your employer simply keeps withholding payroll tax.
• If you leave for more than a year and work outside the EU, your compulsory insurance for WW, WIA and Ziektewet stops. You then have 13 weeks to insure yourself voluntarily.

May I work from abroad for my employer?

Only if he agrees. The Flexible Working Act says: "De werkgever overweegt het verzoek van de werknemer om aanpassing van de arbeidsplaats" (the employer considers the employee's request to change the place of work). If he refuses, he has to discuss it with you. You have more rights over your working hours and the number of hours than over where you work.

There was a bill to change that, the Work Where You Want Act (Wet werken waar je wilt). The Senate rejected it on 26 September 2023. So it never became law.

Put the arrangement in writing: which countries you work in, for how long, and what happens if the trip goes differently.

Who taxes my wages?

The Belastingdienst (Dutch Tax Administration) writes: if the Netherlands may tax your wages, your Dutch employer must withhold payroll taxes (wage tax and, if you are insured, national insurance contributions and employee insurance contributions). Who may tax depends on where you live for tax purposes. That is not the same as where you are registered; see staying registered or deregistering.

Your situation	What happens to your wages
For tax purposes you still live in the Netherlands	The Netherlands taxes your wages. The country you work in may sometimes tax too. With a tax treaty, the 183-day rule can help.
For tax purposes you live in another country	That country may almost always tax. Your employer then usually withholds no payroll tax.
For tax purposes you live nowhere	There is no treaty to divide the taxing right. The Netherlands usually keeps taxing your wages.

The 183-day rule is in most tax treaties. Your wages then stay taxed in your country of residence if you spend no more than 183 days in the country you work in, your employer is not established there, and your wages are not borne by a branch there. All days count, weekends and holidays included, and part of a day counts as a whole day. Whether those 183 days are counted per calendar year, per tax year or per twelve months differs per treaty. Explained, with the thresholds per country, in digital nomad: tax and insurance.

Three limits to that rule:

• It is for employees. If you also work as a self-employed person, a different treaty article applies to that part: the country of work may usually only tax you once you have a permanent establishment there, such as an office.
• It divides between a country of residence and a country of work. Without a country of residence you cannot rely on it.
• It only exists in a treaty. Without a treaty the Netherlands keeps taxing, and only exempts wages on which you actually pay tax in the country of work.

Without a country of residence the rule does not help. A treaty divides the right to tax between a country of residence and a country of work. If you have no country of residence, there is nothing to divide. Dutch law then says: work for a Dutch employer that you do partly outside the Netherlands "wordt geacht geheel in Nederland te zijn vervuld" (is deemed to be done entirely in the Netherlands). That only changes if your wages are actually taxed in another country. Without a country of residence that usually does not happen. What that means for your deductions is in box 3, your BV and inheritance when you live nowhere.

Each country you work in also has its own rules on when you become a tax resident there. Usually that is after 183 days, but many countries have a second rule that kicks in earlier, such as a home or your centre of economic interests. And work you do in a country often counts as domestic income there anyway, even if your employer is in the Netherlands. Ask before a long stay in one place.

Where am I insured within the EU?

Within the EU, the EEA and Switzerland, European rules decide in which country you are insured. On teleworking the SVB (Social Insurance Bank) says: if you work in the Netherlands and go to telework temporarily from another member state, you remain socially insured in the Netherlands "in many cases" if you do so for less than 24 months and telework fully from the other member state during that period.

The proof is the A1 certificate: a form showing in which country you pay contributions. Your employer applies for it online at the SVB, free of charge. Without an A1 you can be fined by the labour inspectorate of the country you work in. An A1 is valid for 24 months at most.

Do you work in several EU countries one after another, without living anywhere? Then it is less clear which country is responsible. Put your route to the SVB in advance.