From the 1st of January next year, Belgium’s new salary thresholds will be implemented in certain regions of the country. Find out more below.
Who will be affected?
Each year the Belgium government establishes new salary thresholds and it affects all inbound immigration procedures into Belgium.
Impact
This new threshold is effective for all applications submitted on or after 1 January 2023. Affecting employers: Those employers who require an extension or new work authorisation on or after this date must increase the salary to comply with the new provided threshold. Failure to do so will automatically result in rejection of the application or externsion.
Even if the employer has a pending application, they must also increase the salary in order to comply with the new threshold as well as inform the regional authorities.
Businesses who already employ foreign workers in the Region will be required to comply with the new thresholds as of 1 January 2023, the employers are responsible to adjust the salaries accordingly.
The tables below show the new salary thresholds in the three regions below:
Brussels
Flanders
Wallonia
New or existing workers with the nationality of a country outside the European Economic Area (EEA) who wish to work in Belgium must obtain a work permit or a B work permit.
Also, the agreed gross salary must be clearly mentioned in the employment contract or the letter of secondment when applying for the first work permit or work permit B. In the event of a request for extension of the work permit or permit of work B, governmental departments will also check whether the agreed amount has actually been paid.
Good to know
These are gross annual salary amounts, assessed solely based on the gross salary or the gross salary components which constitute the counterpart of the work services, and which are known with certainty prior to the work services.
The guaranteed average monthly minimum income applies to workers who are not covered by any joint committee, and even in the case of part-time employment, it must be reached.
For more information on the average monthly minimum income, see the website of the Federal Public Service Employment, Labour and Social Dialogue .