Homeworking due to corona? Ruling Committee makes proposal for costs proper to the employer

Temporary reimbursement of homeworking costs

For companies whose activities enable employees to work from home, an application procedure has been set up whereby a ruling can be requested for temporary compensation for teleworking costs without any substantiation. In this way, the employer can reimburse employees for costs proper to the employer in the form of lump sums. These lump sums serve to cover the costs at the employee’s place of residence related to, for example, the provision and use of a desk, printer and computer equipment, office supplies, utilities such as water, electricity and heating, as well as maintenance, insurance and property tax.

As this is a specific, temporary measure to compensate employees for their work from home as a consequence of coronavirus, all employees will be allocated the same amount of a maximum 126.94 euros per month. To avoid double use of the reimbursements granted, employees who already receive a monthly reimbursement for homeworking will have to waive this existing reimbursement.

Application and validity

The temporary reimbursement of homeworking costs will apply for as long as the measures for fighting Covid-19 are in force. The ruling will then come to an end automatically. This payment as a reimbursement of costs proper to the employer is not taxable as part of the employees’ personal income tax. For the employer, this is a wholly deductible business expense.

Please note that, as the temporary reimbursement of homeworking costs has to be granted as an extra remuneration, this is an aggravating factor in relation to employers’ liquidity. This reimbursement is therefore not always appropriate in times of the corona virus. The corona virus crisis is already having a major impact on orders, turnover, etc. However, granting costs proper to the employer may also be interesting after this period.

If you would like to make use of this measure or if you would like to know which costs proper to the employer you can generally allocate to your employees, then contact your account manager or one of our specialists at contact@vdl.be.