Belgian Employer Rates and Thresholds 2026

Belgian employers pay social security contributions to the ONSS (RSZ) on gross pay, with no ceiling. For most private-sector white-collar employees (structural reduction category 1), the basic employer rate is 19.88%, plus a 4.27% wage moderation contribution charged on the pay and on the employer contributions themselves, so about 25.00% in total.

Employers with an average of 10 or more workers pay a further 1.60%. ONSS is also due on the 13th month, but not on double holiday pay. Accident-at-work insurance and sector fund contributions come on top and vary by insurer and joint committee.

ONSS, the 13th month and double holiday pay for a full year, for a white-collar employee under joint committee 200 at an employer with 10 or more workers (accident insurance and sector contributions extra):

• The guaranteed average minimum monthly income is €2,233.61 for workers aged 18 and over from 1 July 2026. Sector minimum pay scales are often higher.
• Under joint committee 200, white-collar employees receive a year-end bonus equal to one month's salary, and salaries are indexed automatically (2.21% in January 2026). Other joint committees set their own rules.
• Four weeks of paid leave a year (20 days for a five-day week), based on work in the previous year. White-collar employees get their normal salary for leave days plus double holiday pay of 1/12 of 92% of the monthly salary per month worked; on leaving, the employer pays exit holiday pay of 15.34% of the year's gross salary.
• A white-collar employee on an open-ended contract (or one of at least three months) keeps 100% of their pay, paid by the employer, for the first 30 days of incapacity, whatever their seniority. Health insurance pays from day 31. From 2026, an incapacity within eight weeks of returning to work counts as a relapse.
• Ten paid public holidays a year: 1 January, Easter Monday, 1 May, Ascension Day, Whit Monday, 21 July, 15 August, 1 November, 11 November and 25 December. A holiday that falls on a Sunday or normal day off is replaced by another day.
• Working time may not exceed 8 hours a day and 40 hours a week, and since 1 January 2003 all companies must have reduced the working week to 38 hours, on average or in practice. Sector agreements can set fewer hours.

• For contracts starting from 1 August 2026, employer notice is 1 week in the first six months, then 6 weeks (6–9 months), 7 (9–12 months), 8 (12–15 months), 9 (15–18 months), 10 (18–21 months), 11 (21–24 months), 12 (2–3 years), 13 (3–4 years), 15 (4–5 years), then 3 more weeks for each year up to 51 weeks (16–17 years), capped at 52 weeks from 17 years.
• Lending employees to a third party that exercises part of the employer's authority is prohibited, except where the law allows it. If it happens illegally, the contract is void from the start of the work at the user, the user and the worker are treated as bound by an open-ended contract, and both companies are jointly liable for social security and pay.
• Only regionally licensed agencies may carry out temporary agency work, and only for temporary work for one of six reasons (replacement, temporary increase in work, exceptional work, insertion with a view to permanent hiring, artistic work, regional back-to-work programmes), each with its own maximum duration. Pay may not be lower than a comparable permanent employee's at the user.