In our newsflash of 12 March 2021 we referred to the extension until 30 June 2021 of the mutual agreement between Belgium and the Netherlands, which includes a “force majeure tolerance” for cross-border workers in relation to government imposed COVID-19 (travel) restrictions.
With ongoing vaccination marathons the end of the global pandemic definitely seems to be in sight and the outlook for September 2021 is promising. However, during this time of transition many people will still continue working from their home offices and the overall international business travel will still be limited to a certain extent (although business trips are also picking up again). Given the still careful approach with regard to opening up country borders and regions and phasing out of quarantine and safety measures, recently, a further extension was announced with respect to the mutual agreement concluded between Belgium and the Netherlands until 30 September 2021.
Note: the COVID-19 mutual agreements (between Belgium and France / Germany / the Netherlands / Luxembourg) allow for a fiction in relation to the employment income linked to the “home working days” solely due to the measures taken by the governments of the respective countries to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. If certain conditions are met, and the employee chooses to apply the fiction, these “forced home working days” are deemed to be spent by the employee in the state where the cross-border worker would have exercised the employment in case no such measures had been taken.
Now that the mutual agreement between Belgium and the Netherlands has been extended and taking into account that recently the COVID-19 cross-border employment agreements with France, Luxembourg and Germany were also extended, all mutual agreements have been extended until 30 September 2021.
If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact Sandrine Schaumont or Philip Maertens.
