Freelancer-Client Agreement
August 2022 Revision
This agreement is based on the agreement under number 90821.25537.1.0 dated June 1, 2021, published by the Dutch Tax and Customs Administration (Belastingdienst).
The text highlighted in yellow in that model agreement has been adopted unchanged; only the terms "client" and "contractor" have been replaced by "Beeper" and "Helper."
In our view, adjustments to the other text do not conflict with the yellow-highlighted text.
Adjustments for Helpers who wish to take advantage of the benefits of the Beep For Help platform, specifically:
1. The ability to be at a person's doorstep within half an hour to ask: "How can I help you?"
2. Minimal administrative burden, as the platform:
- Shows which requests for help are available and when
- Generates this agreement and (once the Helper accepts the assignment) provides it with two digital signatures and sends it directly to both contracting parties
- Prepares and sends the invoice
- Handles the payment, allowing Helpers to operate entirely independently more quickly
3. The ability to provide fast and reliable help to those in need, even with minimal digital, mental, and physical skills, through a simplified help request (press the help button) and the use of a clear, fixed starting rate and fixed rate per minute visible in the app.
Model agreement: no employer authority
Service Agreement
Parties:
<volledige naam beeper>, residing at <plaats en postcode beeper> at <woonadres beeper>, hereinafter referred to as: Beeper
and
<bedrijfsnaam helper>, established at <bedrijfsadres helper>, legally represented by <volledige naam helper>, hereinafter referred to as: Helper
jointly referred to as: "Parties";
Whereas:
a. Beeper often wishes to live independently for as long as possible and needs help with all activities that can be performed without specific qualifications, such as walking the dog, clearing out the attic, grocery shopping, calling a plumber, doctor, or dentist, ironing, cleaning, planting flowers in the garden, reading aloud, changing light bulbs, etc., etc. With the exception of illegal, dangerous, erotic, or sexual activities.
b. In this context, Beeper requires <categorieën hulpaanvraag> <omschrijving hulpaanvraag>
c. Helper is capable and willing to perform these activities as such.
d. Parties wish to contract with each other exclusively on the basis of a service agreement within the meaning of Article 7:400 et seq. of the Dutch Civil Code.
e. Parties choose, where applicable, to exclude the fictitious employment relationship for home workers or equivalent persons as referred to in Articles 2b and 2c of the Wage Tax Implementation Decree 1965 and Articles 1 and 5 of the Decree designating cases in which the employment relationship is considered an employment contract (Decree of December 24, 1986, Stb. 1986, 655), and to this end draw up and sign this agreement before any payment takes place;
f. This agreement is identical to the model agreement drawn up by the Tax and Customs Administration under number 90821.25537.1.0 dated June 1, 2021;
g. Parties wish to record the conditions under which Helper will perform their activities in this agreement.
h. Beep For Help B.V. hopes and expects to tap into new markets with this, as many complexities have been automated, thought through, and taken off the hands of the parties, so that the increasing demand for (informal) care can be better met.
Parties agree as follows:
Article 1 The Assignment
1.1. Helper undertakes to perform the following activities for the duration of the agreement: <categorieën hulpaanvraag> <omschrijving hulpaanvraag>
Article 2 Execution of the Assignment
2.1. Helper accepts the assignment and thereby accepts full responsibility for the proper execution of the agreed activities.
2.2. Helper organizes their work independently. However, insofar as necessary for the execution of the assignment, coordination with Beeper will take place in the event of collaboration with others, so that this proceeds optimally. If necessary for the work, Helper will align with Beeper's working hours.
2.3. Beeper provides Helper with all authority and information required for the proper execution of the assignment.
2.4. Helper is entirely independent when performing the agreed activities. He/she performs the agreed activities according to their own insight and without supervision or direction from Beeper. Beeper may, however, provide instructions and directions regarding the result of the assignment.
Article 3 Duration of the Agreement
3.1. The assignment commences on <datum hulpaanvraag> and is entered into for the duration of the activity entered on the platform.
3.2. Beeper expressly agrees that Helper also performs work for other clients.
Article 4 Performance and Replacement
4.1. If at any time the Helper foresees that they cannot fulfill the obligations in connection with an accepted assignment, or cannot do so on time or properly, the Helper must immediately inform the Beeper of this.
4.2. Helper will then offer to "beep" another Helper if desired.
Article 5 Termination of the Agreement
5.1. The Beeper can stop the assignment at any time after discussing this with the Helper by pressing the stop button in the app, and the algorithm will stop charging the Beeper after a 5-minute wrap-up period.
Article 6 Remuneration, Invoicing, and Payment
6.1. Beeper pays Helper a € 3.60 starting rate and € 0.36 per minute, including any VAT due.
6.2. Helper will send (or have sent) an invoice to Beeper for the work performed. The invoice will comply with legal requirements.
6.3. Beeper pays the invoiced amount to Helper via the facility offered by the app.
6.4. In the event that tools belonging to Beeper or Helper are necessary for the execution of the assignment, parties can agree on who pays for what and settle this with each other outside the app. The starting point is that Beeper has the tools that Helper needs (e.g., the leash to walk the dog and the spare light bulb).
Article 7 Liability for Damage/Injury
7.1 Parties agree that their mutual liability for material damage and personal injury is limited to what the insurance pays out in that regard.
Article 8 Insurance
8.1 Beep For Help B.V. has a general liability insurance policy (also covering its employees) with Nationale Nederlanden. The deductible is €100 for the Beeper.
Article 9 Governing Law and Jurisdiction
9.1. Dutch law applies to this agreement and everything related to it.
9.2. Disputes regarding this agreement or anything related to or arising from it will be submitted to the competent court in the Netherlands.
Article 10 Amendment of the Agreement
10.1. Amendments to and additions to this agreement are only valid insofar as they have been agreed upon in writing between the parties.
In duplicate,
In Amsterdam on <datum helper accepted>
………………………… …………………………
Beeper Helper
Assessment of Agreement General | direct hiring and no employer authority
The Tax and Customs Administration, in collaboration with VNO-NCW / MKB-Nederland, has drawn up the attached model agreement. You can use this as a model agreement in situations involving direct hiring where there is no employer authority. This model agreement is formulated in general terms, based on the premise that the client lacks the ability to provide direction and supervise the contractor's work. Due to the absence of this employer authority, the Tax and Customs Administration judges that working according to this model agreement does not constitute an employment contract (genuine employment). Parties may—before the (first) payment takes place—choose to exclude the fictitious employment relationship of "equivalent persons" and "home workers" (see "Whereas," under e).
When working according to the attached model agreement, parties may trust that there is no employment contract. With the exception of the situations mentioned in point two of this explanation (fictitious employment relationships), the client is not required to withhold or pay payroll taxes when (factually) working according to this model agreement.
Explanation of this assessment: the starting point of this model agreement is that the contractor works outside of an employment relationship. This means that the contractor and the client must not behave in a way that creates an employment contract (genuine employment). If this were (nevertheless) the case, payroll taxes would be due.
1. No employment contract (genuine employment): an employment contract (genuine employment) is created, in short, if:
1. the work must be done by the person themselves (replacement is not allowed); AND
2. the client can indicate how the work must be performed (freedom is limited); AND
3. a fee is paid for the work performed.
An employment contract (genuine employment) is only created if all three conditions are met. Parties cannot exclude the creation of an employment contract (genuine employment) by stating (in advance) in an agreement that they do not want one. If they do not wish to enter into an employment contract (genuine employment), it is first important that what the parties agree upon in the model agreement does not lead to the fulfillment of the aforementioned conditions.
Secondly, it is important that parties factually work as they have agreed in the agreement. This general, not yet concretely filled-in model agreement is worded in such a way that the second condition (authority) is not met. See Article 2 of the agreement for this. The client may only provide directions and instructions regarding what the contractor is going to do (effort or result) and not how the work is performed.
An employment contract (genuine employment) can be excluded, provided that the client and contractor also (factually) behave as they have agreed in the agreement. In this case, the client may assume with this model agreement that no payroll taxes are due.
2. Reservation regarding other fictitious employment relationships: This general model agreement is specifically drawn up for situations involving direct hiring where employer authority is absent. This agreement cannot be used for situations where other fictitious employment relationships may apply. This is the case with:
- Contracting of work
- Intermediaries, agents
- Interns
- Working children
- Directors of entities
- Sex workers
- Top athletes
- (Partners of) holders of a substantial interest who perform work for the relevant entity
- Artists and professional athletes working on the basis of a short-term agreement
- Crew of fishing vessels (share fishermen)
- Work via the intervention of a third party (intermediary).
For these cases, the client cannot derive the certainty from this model agreement that they do not owe payroll taxes.
3. Certainty conditional on factual execution
The certainty that the client does not have to withhold or pay payroll taxes only applies if parties act in practice in accordance with what they have agreed upon in this model agreement. Only on this basis can it be assumed that there is no employment contract (genuine employment).
4. No judgment on entrepreneurship for income tax or consequences for turnover tax and corporate tax
An agreement is the recording of arrangements between client and contractor. The Tax and Customs Administration only assesses agreements to answer the question of whether there is an obligation to withhold or pay payroll taxes. Based on this model agreement, the Tax and Customs Administration cannot provide a judgment on whether someone is an entrepreneur for income tax purposes.
The Tax and Customs Administration also cannot provide a judgment on the consequences for turnover tax. In the event that this agreement is used by a non-natural person (such as a private limited company), the judgment only means that the client does not owe payroll taxes. This judgment has no significance for corporate tax. The Tax and Customs Administration also cannot provide a judgment regarding other specific (non-tax) laws and regulations.
5. Use of model agreement reference number and reference
This model agreement is registered with the Tax and Customs Administration on June 1, 2021, under number 90821.25537.1.0.
When using a model agreement assessed by the Tax and Customs Administration, the actually used agreement must refer to the number assigned by the Tax and Customs Administration to the assessed model. For this purpose, the following text must always be used in the agreement between client and contractor:
"This agreement is identical to the model agreement drawn up by the Tax and Customs Administration on 01-06-2021 under number 90821.25537.1.0."
If the above text is not included in the agreement, parties cannot derive the trust from the agreement used by the client and contractor that no payroll taxes need to be withheld or paid.
6. Marked provisions, additions, and changes: Certain articles in this agreement are marked. These provisions contain conditions that are important in determining whether there is an absence of an employment relationship. These provisions may therefore not be changed. If these marked provisions are (nevertheless) changed, then after the change, the certainty that the client does not have to withhold or pay payroll taxes can no longer be derived.
You may add to and adapt the non-marked articles for your own situation, provided they do not conflict with the marked articles and/or the character of the model agreement. The same applies to declaring applicable regulations, general terms and conditions, etc., that were not submitted with the request to the Tax and Customs Administration.
7. Validity period of assessment
The Tax and Customs Administration has drawn up this model agreement in collaboration with VNO-NCW and MKB-Nederland. Interim evaluation of the use of the model agreement may be a reason to adjust the agreement.
The judgment on this model agreement has a validity period of five years, calculated from the date of drafting, subject to changes in relevant laws or regulations during those five years. Jurisprudence and changed policy may also be a reason to withdraw the judgment on this model agreement for the future. In doing so, the Tax and Customs Administration will observe the principles of proper administration.
8. No liability for damage
The Tax and Customs Administration, in collaboration with VNO-NCW and MKB-Nederland, has drawn up this model agreement solely for the purpose of providing certainty for working outside of an employment relationship in the context of payroll taxes.
The Tax and Customs Administration and VNO-NCW and MKB-Nederland are not liable for consequences of any nature whatsoever resulting from the use of the model.