Employing staff in the Netherlands, read line by line
- Wage tax & social premiums−€1,05026%
- Holiday allowance reserved€3208%
- Net paid to employee€2,63066%
Ready to get started?
Skip the theory. These are the guides founders open when they are about to hire, price a quote, or hand Dutch payroll to someone else.
Everything an employer in the Netherlands has to get right
From the first job offer to the last payslip, Dutch payroll is a chain of small, unforgiving details. We line them up in the order you meet them, so nothing about employing staff in the Netherlands catches you out.
Gross-to-net, decoded
See exactly which wage tax and social premiums come off a Dutch salary, and what actually lands in your employee's account.
Contracts & leave, done right
Fixed-term or permanent, 8% holiday pay, vacation days and two years of sick pay: the rules Dutch employers cannot skip.
Do it yourself, or hand it over
Weigh running your own payroll against payrolling and an employer of record, and see the point where outsourcing pays.
Three steps from hire to paid
Strip away the vocabulary and Dutch payroll is a short, repeatable loop. Once you have run it once, every following month is the same rhythm.
Register as an employer
Sign your first employee, then register with the Dutch tax office (Belastingdienst) to receive a payroll tax number. This is a one-time step per company.
Run the monthly payslip
Each month you calculate gross pay, deduct wage tax and social premiums, reserve 8% holiday allowance and pay the net amount to your employee.
File and pay the tax office
You file the wage tax return and pay the withheld tax and premiums to the Belastingdienst, on time, every month. Miss it and penalties follow.
Dutch payroll words, in one line each
Dutch payroll comes wrapped in Dutch vocabulary. Learn these six terms and every payslip, contract and letter from the tax office suddenly reads clearly.
The combined wage tax and social security premiums an employer withholds from gross salary and pays to the Dutch tax office each month.
Holiday allowance: at least 8% of annual gross salary, reserved through the year and usually paid out in May.
A tax break that lets qualifying foreign employees receive up to 30% of salary tax-free, making the Netherlands attractive to international talent.
Directeur-grootaandeelhouder: a director who is also a major shareholder, and who must pay themselves a legal minimum salary.
A collective labour agreement for a sector or company that can set pay, hours and leave above the statutory minimums.
Werkkostenregeling: the work-related costs scheme that caps how much an employer can give staff tax-free in perks and allowances.
Browse all topics
Rather read around a subject first? Every area of Dutch payroll and employment, from your first hire to director pay, gathered in one place with all of its guides.
Your first hireHiring Your First Employee
Taking on your first employee in the Netherlands means registering as an employer, running real payroll and knowing what a hire actually costs on top of gross salary. These guides walk foreign founders through every step, from job offer to first payslip, without the jargon.
All 20 guides ›
Wage tax & premiumsPayroll Taxes and Wage Tax
Dutch payroll tax bundles wage tax and social security premiums into one monthly filing. These guides explain the rates, the 30% ruling, tax credits and the gross-to-net journey, so the deductions on a Dutch payslip finally make sense.
All 19 guides ›
Contracts & leaveContracts, Leave and Sick Pay
Dutch employment law is generous to employees and precise about paperwork. These guides cover fixed-term versus permanent contracts, the 8% holiday allowance, vacation days, notice periods and the two years of sick pay every Dutch employer should plan for.
All 20 guides ›
Payrolling & EORPayrolling, EOR and Outsourcing
Not every company wants to run its own Dutch payroll. Payrolling, an employer of record and outsourced administration each solve it differently. These guides compare the models, the costs and the point where handing payroll to a specialist simply pays off.
All 19 guides ›
Director payDGA Salary and Director Pay
A director who owns the company is a DGA, and Dutch law sets a minimum salary they must pay themselves. These guides explain the 2026 DGA salary rule, the salary-versus-dividend choice, and how to stay on the right side of the tax office as an owner-director.
All 14 guides ›
Let a specialist handle Dutch payroll
Scrappy Business is an independent guide, so you can read first and decide later. When you do need someone to actually run the payroll, Intercompany Solutions handles Dutch employer registration, monthly payslips and wage tax filing remotely from its office in the World Trade Center Rotterdam, including for founders who employ staff in the Netherlands from another country.
Read the hiring guides ›- ✓Employer registration with the Belastingdienst
- ✓Monthly payslips and wage tax returns
- ✓Remote setup for companies based abroad
Plain answers before you pay for advice
Employing people in the Netherlands is not hard once someone lays it out in order, but the information is scattered across tax-office pages, payroll blogs and forum threads in two languages. Scrappy Business gathers it in one place, in English, in the sequence you actually need it: understand the payslip first, then contracts and leave, then the choice between doing payroll yourself and handing it over.
There are 92 plain-English guides here, each checked against current Dutch rules for 2026. Pick a topic above, or follow the three-step loop from employer registration to a filed wage tax return. An hour of reading here means you brief any adviser precisely and never pay by the hour for a question a guide can answer.