Social Security & Taxes
Cross-border living and working in our region has become a normal phenomenon in the last years. Working from home is widespread as a result of the corona pandemic. However, there are a number of things to consider when working across borders. More and more employers and employees want to work more at home after the corona pandemic is over. This can have consequences for employees and employers related to social security and taxes.
For Social Security this is organized as following:
During the corona pandemic, exception rules were drawn up to prevent employees and employers from suddenly being confronted with different rules. For social security it is assumed that you fall under the system you would fall under if the pandemic did not occur. In other words: you work at home because of the corona measures and you would normally have been at the office in the other country during that time. Regarding the social security this means that you have been working at the office during that time. For most people, the exception rule in social security means that there is no change in the applicable legislation. As things stand, the regulation is valid until 31 December 2021.
For Taxes this is organized as following:
As a cross-border employee you work from home as a result of the corona pandemic. This can have consequences for your taxes. It can be that your work income is not taxed in your work country anymore, but (partly) in your country of residence. This can have consequences for your net income. Therefore, The Netherlands has made an agreement with Belgium and Germany related to tax treaties the days you work from home. For cross-border employees, the Netherlands has agreed with Belgium and Germany that the working days at home may be treated as days worked in the country where you would have worked under normal circumstances, provided that these home working days are taxed in the other country. You do not have to opt for this different treatment. You can also continue to treat the home working days as days on which work was actually done. You can apply the agreements made in the existing income tax return 2020. The agreements with Belgium and Germany are valid until including
December 31, 2021.
In December it will be decided whether the rules for social security and taxes will be continued.
Source: Cross-border InfoPoint Scheldemond and site tax authorities