No Weighting Based on Working Time for Tax Exemption – Supreme Court Ruling of 22 July 2025 (Dutch-speaking Chamber)

Brief: A taxpayer applied for the exemption provided under Article 67ter, §1 of the 1992 Income Tax Code, which allows for an exemption of profits up to an amount of €3,720 per additional staff member employed in Belgium, provided that the gross salary does not exceed a certain threshold and the company employs fewer than eleven workers. The legal provision does not differentiate, for the purpose of determining the number of employees, between full-time and part-time workers.

The Brussels Court of Appeal had ruled that part-time workers should be counted on a pro-rata basis, relative to the number of hours worked compared to a full-time schedule, thereby reducing their impact on the total employee count.

The Supreme Court overturned this interpretation, ruling that by introducing a condition not provided for in the legal text, the appellate judges had failed to justify their decision in accordance with the law. It therefore set aside the judgement and referred the case to the Court of Appeal in Ghent for reconsideration.

Source: Stradalex