Employment Law Update in Belgium: Q4 2025

Belgium employment law 2025 entered its final quarter with a concentrated wave of legislative activity, administrative guidance and notable case law that directly affects how employers hire, manage and terminate staff. The changes touch working-time flexibility, platform work classification, pay transparency obligations and the ongoing reform of dismissal procedures. This guide maps the key developments, explains what they require in practice and highlights the compliance steps that Belgian employers and international groups with Belgian operations should prioritise.

Belgium';s Act on Workable and Agile Work, which introduced the four-day working week and annualised working-time frameworks, continued to generate practical questions throughout the quarter. The National Labour Council issued updated guidance clarifying how employers must document individual working-time arrangements when an employee opts for a compressed schedule. Employers are required to record the agreed schedule in a written addendum to the employment contract and to notify the joint committee within the applicable deadline.

The right to disconnect, embedded in collective bargaining agreement No. 149 concluded within the National Labour Council, also attracted enforcement attention during the quarter. Labour inspectors from the Federal Public Service Employment, Labour and Social Dialogue began auditing whether companies with more than twenty employees had adopted a written policy on after-hours reachability. Employers without a documented policy face formal warnings and, on repeat inspection, administrative fines. In practice, many international groups assumed that a group-level policy drafted for another jurisdiction would satisfy Belgian requirements; it does not. The policy must be adopted through the internal social consultation process - either via the works council or, where none exists, through the trade union delegation.

A non-obvious requirement is that the right-to-disconnect policy must be included in the company';s work rules (règlement de travail / arbeidsreglement). Amending the work rules triggers a mandatory consultation procedure with employee representatives and a deposit with the competent regional labour authority. Many employers underestimate the lead time this requires - typically six to eight weeks from the start of consultation to formal entry into force.

One of the most consequential developments in recent Belgian employment law is the transposition of the EU Platform Work Directive into national legislation. Belgium moved ahead of several neighbouring jurisdictions by introducing a statutory rebuttable presumption of employment for persons performing digital platform work. Under the new framework, a platform worker is presumed to be an employee if at least two out of five defined criteria are met. Those criteria relate to algorithmic management of tasks, restrictions on the worker';s ability to set prices, supervision through electronic means, restrictions on working for competitors and the platform';s control over the worker';s presentation to clients.

The practical consequence is significant. Platforms operating in Belgium that previously classified workers as independent contractors must now conduct a documented assessment against the five criteria. Where two or more criteria are present, the burden shifts to the platform to rebut the presumption before the labour courts. The Federal Public Service Employment has indicated that it will treat the presumption as a starting point for inspection visits, meaning that platforms without a written classification analysis are immediately exposed.

For international businesses using gig-economy or marketplace models in Belgium, this creates an urgent compliance task. A common mistake is to rely on the contractual label - "freelance", "self-employed", "service provider" - without examining the operational reality against the statutory criteria. Belgian courts have consistently held that the economic and organisational reality of the relationship prevails over the parties'; chosen label.

Employers and platforms that find themselves on the wrong side of the presumption face retroactive social security contributions, holiday pay arrears and, in serious cases, criminal liability under the Social Penal Code. The Social Penal Code distinguishes between level-one and level-four infringements; misclassification of workers typically falls at level three or four, carrying substantial fines per affected worker.

If your organisation operates a platform model or uses a significant number of freelancers in Belgium, a classification audit is advisable before the next inspection cycle. We can help structure the setup correctly the first time - contact info@vlolawfirm.com.

Belgium';s implementation of the EU Pay Transparency Directive accelerated during the quarter, with the Institute for the Equality of Women and Men publishing practical guidance for employers on the forthcoming pay-reporting obligations. Although the Directive';s full reporting requirements apply progressively based on employer size, Belgian law already imposes pay equity obligations under the Gender Pay Gap Act and the Act of 22 April 2012 on combating the gender pay gap.

Under current Belgian rules, employers with more than fifty employees must conduct a biennial pay analysis and present the results to the works council or, where no works council exists, to the trade union delegation. The analysis must cover base pay, variable pay, bonuses and non-cash benefits, broken down by gender and job category. Where a statistically significant gap is identified, the employer must draw up an action plan with concrete measures and timelines.

The new transparency layer adds individual pay-information rights. Employees will be entitled to request information about the pay range applicable to their role and about average pay levels for comparable roles, disaggregated by gender. Employers must be able to respond to such requests without disclosing individual colleagues'; salaries. In practice, this requires employers to have a documented job-classification system and a pay-band structure that can be communicated coherently. Many Belgian SMEs and Belgian subsidiaries of international groups currently lack this infrastructure.

A practical scenario: a Belgian subsidiary of a US technology group has historically set salaries on an individual negotiation basis, with no formal bands. Under the incoming transparency rules, the subsidiary will need to retrofit a grading structure, align it with the group';s global compensation framework and ensure that the Belgian works council is consulted on the new system before it is implemented. The consultation right of the works council over remuneration systems is grounded in the Act of 20 September 1948 on the organisation of the economy and in collective bargaining agreement No. 9. Bypassing this consultation exposes the employer to nullity of the new system and potential unfair labour practice claims.

Belgium';s single statute framework, which aligned blue-collar and white-collar notice periods following the Constitutional Court';s landmark ruling, has been subject to further refinement. The quarter saw the publication of updated guidance from the National Employment Office (ONEM/RVA) on the calculation of notice periods for employees with mixed career histories - those who have held both blue-collar and white-collar roles within the same company or group.

The guidance clarifies that seniority for notice-period purposes is calculated on the basis of continuous service with the legal employer, not with the economic group as a whole. This matters for international groups that restructure Belgian operations through mergers, demergers or transfers of undertakings. Under the Act of 26 March 1999 on the Belgian Action Plan for Employment and various implementing decrees, a transfer of undertaking under the Acquired Rights Directive (implemented in Belgium through collective bargaining agreement No. 32bis) preserves the employee';s seniority with the transferee. However, where a restructuring does not qualify as a transfer of undertaking, seniority resets - a point that frequently surprises foreign acquirers.

A second practical scenario illustrates the risk: a French industrial group acquires a Belgian company through an asset deal rather than a share deal. The Belgian employees are offered new contracts with the acquirer. Unless the transaction qualifies as a transfer of undertaking under collective bargaining agreement No. 32bis, the employees'; seniority for notice purposes does not automatically transfer. If the group later needs to restructure and terminate employees, it may face significantly lower notice obligations than expected - but also potential claims from employees who argue that the original seniority should have been preserved.

Outplacement obligations also received attention during the quarter. Under Belgian law, employees aged forty-five or over who are dismissed with a notice period or indemnity equivalent to thirty weeks or more are entitled to outplacement services. The employer must offer these services proactively; failure to do so results in a financial penalty equivalent to the cost of the outplacement programme. Labour inspectors have been checking compliance with this obligation more systematically, particularly in the context of collective redundancy procedures.

Belgium';s collective redundancy framework, governed by the Act of 13 February 1998 (the Renault Act) and implementing royal decrees, imposes strict information and consultation obligations before any collective dismissal can take effect. The quarter saw a significant labour court ruling in which a Belgian court found that an employer had breached the Renault Act by announcing a restructuring to the press before formally notifying the works council. The court ordered a suspension of the dismissal procedure and awarded damages to the affected employees.

The ruling reinforces a well-established but frequently overlooked principle: the information-consultation procedure must be initiated before any public announcement, before any individual notice is given and before any irreversible decision is taken. The works council must receive a written information document covering the reasons for the planned redundancies, the number and categories of workers affected, the criteria for selection and the proposed measures to mitigate the impact. The consultation phase must be genuine - not a formality - and must last at least thirty days (or sixty days for larger redundancies).

For international groups, the interaction between Belgian information-consultation requirements and group-level decision-making processes is a persistent source of difficulty. A common mistake is for the group';s headquarters to announce a restructuring in a press release or earnings call before the Belgian works council has been formally informed. Even if the Belgian subsidiary is not the decision-maker, Belgian law holds the legal employer responsible for ensuring that the consultation procedure is respected. The Renault Act';s penalties include the obligation to continue paying salaries during any period of procedural non-compliance.

Employers planning restructurings that may affect Belgian headcount should build the works council consultation timeline into the overall project plan from the outset. The minimum thirty-day consultation period, combined with the requirement to negotiate a social plan, means that the Belgian leg of a European restructuring typically takes longer than equivalent procedures in neighbouring jurisdictions.

For guidance on structuring a compliant collective redundancy process in Belgium, contact info@vlolawfirm.com. We can assist with documents, filings and works council consultation strategy.

Does the platform work presumption apply to all types of freelance work in Belgium?

The statutory presumption introduced under the recent Belgian legislation applies specifically to work performed through digital labour platforms - that is, platforms that use algorithmic systems to allocate tasks, set prices or supervise performance. Traditional freelance arrangements where a self-employed person contracts directly with a client company, without platform intermediation, are not automatically covered by the presumption. However, Belgian courts and the social inspection services have long applied a broader economic-reality test to any working relationship, regardless of the label used. Employers using freelancers in any context should assess the relationship against the criteria set out in the Programme Act of 27 December 2006, which established the general reclassification framework, in addition to the new platform-specific rules.

How long does a collective redundancy procedure typically take in Belgium, and what are the main cost drivers?

A collective redundancy procedure in Belgium rarely concludes in under two months and frequently takes three to four months when a social plan is being negotiated. The mandatory information-consultation phase under the Renault Act takes a minimum of thirty days, but in practice works councils often request extensions and additional information, which the employer is obliged to provide. The main cost drivers are the notice indemnities or notice periods for affected employees (calculated on the basis of the single statute), the outplacement obligation for employees aged forty-five or over, any collectively agreed severance supplements negotiated in the social plan and the administrative costs of notifying ONEM/RVA and the regional employment services. Employers should also factor in the cost of legal and HR advisory support throughout the procedure.

What must a Belgian employer do to comply with the right-to-disconnect obligation?

An employer with more than twenty employees in Belgium must adopt a written policy on the right to disconnect and include it in the company';s work rules. The policy must address the circumstances in which employees may be contacted outside working hours, the tools and channels covered and the measures taken to ensure that employees are not penalised for not responding to out-of-hours communications. The policy must be developed through the internal social consultation process - via the works council or trade union delegation - before it is incorporated into the work rules. The work rules amendment must then be deposited with the competent regional labour authority. Employers who have adopted a group-level policy for another jurisdiction should not assume it satisfies Belgian requirements without a specific review and adaptation.

The final quarter brought a concentrated set of changes to Belgium employment law 2025 that require concrete action from employers, not merely awareness. Platform reclassification risk, pay transparency infrastructure, works council consultation obligations and dismissal procedure compliance are all areas where inaction carries measurable financial and legal exposure. International groups with Belgian operations should treat these developments as prompts for a structured compliance review rather than background reading.

VLO Law Firms advises international clients on employment law matters in Belgium. We can assist with platform worker classification audits, works council consultation procedures, pay transparency compliance, collective redundancy planning and employment contract reviews. To request a consultation, contact: info@vlolawfirm.com