From 1 August, employers will be required to include more terms and conditions of employment in the employment contract.
What should I change?
Our current legislation already sets out a number of requirements that an employer must meet when entering into an employment contract. For example, the names of the parties, the employee’s place of work, the date of commencement of employment, etc. From 1 August, a number of additional provisions and amendments will be introduced, including those set out in the document we have published article regarding the ban on secondary employment.
What you need to amend in your (model) employment contract before 1 August 2022 will, of course, depend on how comprehensive your current model is. We can assist you with this if required.
Overview of changes
One major change concerns the current Section 7:655(1) of the Dutch Civil Code. The forthcoming amendments to that provision are shown in italics below, enabling you to assess whether you need to amend certain clauses in your (model) employment contract. As an employer, you were already required to comply with the text in bold when entering into the employment contract (it may also be worth reviewing this again).
1 The employer is obliged to provide the employee with a written or electronic statement containing at least the following information:
a. name and place of residence of the parties;
b. the place or places where the work is carried out and, where the work is not carried out at a fixed place or is not carried out primarily at a fixed place, a statement to the effect that the employee carries out his work at various locations or is free to determine his place of work;
c. the role of the employee or the nature of their work;
d. the time from the date of commencement of employment;
e. if the contract is for a fixed term, the end date or the duration of the agreement;
f. holiday entitlement or any other paid leave to which the employee is entitled or the method used to calculate the entitlements;
g. the procedure, including the requirements and the notice periods, which the employer and the employee must observe if the employment contract is terminated, or, if the duration of the notice periods cannot be specified at the time the information is provided, the manner in which those notice periods are determined;
h. the wage including the initial amount, its individual components, the method and frequency of payment, and where the wages depend on the results of the work to be carried out, the amount of work to be performed each day or week, the price per unit and the time reasonably required to carry out the work;
i. if the times at which the employee is required to carry out the work:
1°. be wholly or largely predictable, including the duration of normal daily or weekly working hours, arrangements relating to work outside normal daily or weekly working hours and the pay for such work, and, where applicable, all arrangements concerning shift changes;
or
2°. are wholly or largely unpredictable:
- the principle that the times at which the work is to be carried out are variable, the number of guaranteed paid hours, and the pay for work carried out in addition to those guaranteed hours;
- ii. the days and hours on which the employee may be required to work; and iii. the time limits applicable under Article 628b(3);
j. whether the employee is going to take part in a pension scheme;
k. if the employee is on long-term more than four consecutive weeks will be working outside the Netherlands, including the duration of that employment, accommodation, the applicability of Dutch social security legislation or a statement specifying the bodies responsible for implementing that legislation, the currency in which payment will be made, the allowances to which the employee is entitled, and the arrangements for return;
l. the relevant collective agreement or an arrangement made by or on behalf of a competent administrative body, or the applicable terms and conditions of employment pursuant to Article 8 or 8a of the Act on the Allocation of Labour by Intermediaries;
m. whether the employment contract is a temporary agency contract or a payroll contract;
n. whether the employment contract for has been entered into for an indefinite period;
o. whether there is an on-call contract;
p. in the case of a temporary employment contract, the identity of the client company, if and as soon as this is known;
q. where applicable, the duration and terms of the probationary period;
r. where applicable, the right to training provided by the employer;
s. insofar as the employer is responsible for this, the identity of the social security institutions that receive social security contributions in connection with the employment relationship and the social security protection provided by the employer.
As an employer, you must provide the information listed under a to e, h, i and q no later than one week after the start of employment, and the remaining information within one month at the latest. Our advice, of course, is that it is always sensible to agree the terms of the employment contract in writing with the employee before the start date.
Finally, any changes to the terms and conditions of employment must be set out in writing as soon as possible, but no later than the day on which the change takes effect.