Working in Morocco: the visa on your contract, the tax and the route as a freelancer

As a Dutch national you can work as an employee in Morocco, but not on your own initiative. The labour code obliges the employer to obtain a permit from the Ministry of Labour for every foreign employee, and that permit takes the form of a visa on your employment contract. The date of that visa is the date on which your contract takes effect. From then on you are insured in Morocco and you pay income tax there: nothing up to 40,000 dirhams a year, above that rising to 37 percent.

How does the permit work?

Article 516 of the labour code is short and decisive. An employer who wants to hire a foreign employee must obtain a permit from the authority in charge of labour, and that permit is granted as a visa on the contract. Every change to the contract needs such a visa again, and the permit can be withdrawn at any time. The contract itself must follow the model set by the ministry.

That works through into your residence. Whoever is going to exercise a professional activity that needs a permit, and presents that permit, receives a carte d'immatriculation with the name of that profession on it. Without a permit the card is refused for that purpose. How the various residence routes run is in the residence routes to Morocco.

Your contract does not take effect on the day you sign. It takes effect on the date of the visa. Whoever starts before the visa is there works without a contract that is in force, and the employer risks a fine of 2,000 to 5,000 dirhams. The contract must also state that the employer pays for your journey home if the permit is refused. If that is not in it, ask about it before you resign from your job in the Netherlands.

What is in a Moroccan employment contract?

Part of the terms is fixed by law. These rules come from the labour code as it appeared in the Bulletin Officiel in 2004:

Subject	What the labour code says
Probation, permanent contract	3 months for managerial staff, one and a half months for employees, 15 days for workers; renewable once
Written contract	in two copies, with legalised signatures; you keep one
Normal working hours outside agriculture	2,288 hours a year or 44 hours a week
Paid leave	after six months of service one and a half working days per month
Extra leave	one and a half days per five years of service, up to a maximum of 30 working days

Where do you pay tax and contributions?

Contributions. The social security convention between the Netherlands and Morocco places your insurance in the country where you work, even if your employer is in the other country. An exception applies to whoever is posted temporarily by an employer: then the Dutch insurance continues to apply, for twelve months at most, with permission for another twelve. If you are still working in Morocco after that, your insurance runs there.

Tax. The tax treaty gives the country where you carry out the employment the right to tax your salary. Morocco also taxes everyone with a tax residence in the country on their entire income; you have that residence with a permanent home, the centre of your economic interests, or more than 183 days of stay in a period of 365 days. The rate:

Annual income in dirhams	Rate
up to 40,000	exempt
40,001 to 60,000	10 %
60,001 to 80,000	20 %
80,001 to 100,000	30 %
100,001 to 180,000	34 %
above 180,000	37 %

What happens to your Dutch state pension and pension if you receive a pension alongside your work is in state pension, pension and tax in Morocco.

Can you work as a freelancer?

The tax code has a simple regime for the auto-entrepreneur: you pay tax on your turnover received instead of on your profit.

Activity	Turnover limit per year	Tax on turnover
Trade, industry and crafts	500,000 dirhams	0.5 %
Services	200,000 dirhams	1 %

Two conditions that matter. You must join the social security scheme. And if your turnover from services for one client exceeds 80,000 dirhams a year, that client withholds 30 percent tax on the excess. A number of liberal professions, such as lawyers and architects, fall outside the regime.

What if you come as a visiteur?

Then, to get the card, you have proved that you live on your own means and undertaken not to exercise any professional activity that needs a permit in Morocco. If you keep working from Morocco for a Dutch employer or Dutch clients, put that before an adviser who knows both countries before you leave. The social security convention places the insurance, by the letter, in the country where you work, and the tax question hangs on your tax residence. What moves with you on the Dutch side with remote work or your own business is in the step-by-step plan at /marokko.

In Vertrekklaar this is phase 2 of 5 of the journey, step 2.2: the same steps, but for your situation — in your order, tickable, and with the deadlines watched. See the whole journey to Morocco or go straight to step 2.2 in the open plan.