The year end bonus in Belgium in 2026 depends on your employee's joint committee. In one committee you pay a monthly salary yourself in December, in another a social fund pays a percentage of the pay you declared, and in construction there is no year end bonus at all but blue-collar workers get loyalty stamps. Below you see per committee who pays, when and how the bonus is calculated, each with its own page and the collective agreement as the source.
Year end bonus Belgium 2026: the overview by joint committee
| Committee | Sector | Who pays | When | Calculation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| JC 100 | Blue-collar workers (auxiliary committee), annual bonus | employer | in December | 31 x the basic hourly wage on 1 December, after 6 months of service |
| JC 111 | Metal, machine and electrical engineering, blue-collar | employer | per province; East Flanders: last working day before 25 December 2026 | East Flanders: weekly hours x 52 / 12 x hourly wage |
| JC 112 | Garage blue-collar workers | employer | by 20 December 2026 at the latest | hourly wage of 1 December x weekly hours x 52 / 12 |
| JC 116 | Blue-collar workers, chemical industry | employer | before 25 December 2026 | 173.33 x base hourly wage of 1 December (40 hours), after 3 months of service |
| JC 118 | Food industry blue-collar workers | employer | before 25 December 2026 | 4 1/3 weeks of gross December hourly wage plus bonuses, after 1 month of service |
| JC 119 | Food trade blue-collar workers | employer | second half of December | 164.66 times the hourly wage, after 3 months of service |
| JC 121 | Cleaning (blue-collar workers) | Cleaning sector Social Fund (SFSOO) | from December, vouchers by 15 December 2026 | 9% of gross pay, after 60 social security days |
| JC 124 | Construction, blue-collar workers | Constructiv (loyalty stamps) | from 26 October 2026 | no bonus: stamps worth 9% of gross pay, July to June |
| JC 140.03 | Road transport and logistics workers (140.03) | SFTL (social fund) | from 20 December 2026 | 5% of declared pay from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026, minimum € 2,500 |
| JC 145 | Horticulture | social fund (blue-collar), employer (office staff) | in December, by the fund | 8.33% (tree nurseries) or 7.55% of gross pay; office staff one month |
| JC 149.01 | Electricians: installation and distribution, blue-collar | Volta (fund) | before 31 December 2026, around mid-December | 8.33% of gross pay from July to June |
| JC 149.04 | Metal trade blue-collar workers | employer | with the first pay run after 31 December 2026 | hourly wage of 31 December x weekly hours x 52 / 12 |
| JC 200 | White-collar employees (supplementary committee) | employer | by December at the latest | 100% of the monthly salary, after 6 months of service |
| JC 201 | Independent retail (white-collar employees) | employer | between 15 and 31 December | 100% of the monthly salary, 6 months of service on 31 December |
| JC 202 | Food retail (white-collar employees), with JSC 202.01 | employer | before Christmas Day (202.01: 15 to 31 December) | gross December salary, after 3 months of work in the year |
| JC 207 | White-collar staff, chemical industry | employer | before 25 December 2026 | 100% of the December base salary, after 6 months of service |
| JC 209 | White-collar staff, metal manufacturing | employer | East Flanders: by 31 January 2027 | per province; East Flanders: 100% of the gross July salary |
| JC 220 | Food industry white-collar employees | employer | before 25 December 2026 | gross December monthly salary plus variable pay, after 1 month of service |
| JC 226 | White-collar staff in international trade, transport and logistics | employer | at the end of the year | 1 month's pay of the payment month, 1/12 per full month |
| JC 302 | Hospitality (hotels, restaurants, cafés) | Horeca Fund, financed by employer advances | by 31 January 2027 at the latest | up to 4.33 weeks of pay, one twelfth per 21.67 days |
| JC 311 | Large retail businesses (blue- and white-collar) | employer | during December | actual December salary (full-time, permanent), after 3 months of service |
| JC 314 | Hairdressing, beauty care and fitness | Sector Social Security Fund (FBZ) | from 4 January 2027 | 9.50% of gross annual pay, after 32 days |
| JC 319.01 | Flemish education and housing services | employer | in December | 100% of the October gross monthly salary, one twelfth per month |
| JC 322 | Temporary agency workers | Social Fund for temporary agency workers | document in December, fund pays from 4 January 2027 | 8.33% of gross pay as a temp, after 65 days or 494 hours |
| JC 322.01 | Service vouchers | Social Fund for service vouchers | automatically on 1 December 2026 | 4.50% of gross pay, after 30 working days in the sector |
| JC 329.01 | Subsidised Flemish socio-cultural sector | employer | in December | usually a fixed part plus 5.76% of annual pay, or one monthly salary |
| JC 330 | Healthcare: federal private and Flemish sectors | employer | by December at the latest | indexed flat amount plus 3.03% of 12 x the October salary |
Click the committee for the full rules: the conditions, the absences treated as worked, what applies on dismissal, and the number and date of the collective agreement. Each page also states when we last checked the rules. The table summarises and does not replace the agreement. A company agreement, the employment contract or an established practice in your company may be more favourable, and in case of doubt the text of the agreement and the rules of the social fund take precedence.
Who pays the year end bonus in Belgium: three systems
In the committees of this overview we see three ways of paying the bonus.
- You pay it yourself, through payroll. That is how it works for most white-collar employees, as in JC 200, 201, 202, 207, 209, 220, 226 and 311, and for many blue-collar workers, as in JC 100, 111, 112, 116, 118, 119 and 149.04. The bonus goes through a normal payslip, with 13.07% employee social security and withholding tax under the scale for exceptional payments.
- A social fund pays, and you finance the fund. In road haulage (JC 140.03) the SFTL pays, in cleaning the sector's social fund, for electricians Volta, for hairdressers the subsistence security fund, in horticulture the guarantee and social fund, and for temp workers and service vouchers the sector's own social fund. In hospitality you pay a monthly advance to the Horeca fund, which pays the bonus in January. You then do not put the bonus on the payslip. The fund makes the deductions itself; for withholding tax that is 23.22% according to the Federal Public Service Finance.
- No year end bonus, but another benefit. In construction (JC 124), blue-collar workers get loyalty stamps of 9% of their gross pay, paid through Constructiv. In JC 100 it is called an annual bonus, not a year end bonus, but it is also paid in December.
If a fund pays the bonus and you add a bonus of your own out of goodwill, you pay that entirely yourself, with normal social security and withholding tax. Put in writing what you give and why, so that it does not become an established practice you never intended.
When is the 2026 year end bonus paid?
The calendar differs a lot by sector. The fixed dates:
| When | What |
|---|---|
| from 26 October 2026 | loyalty stamps in construction (JC 124) |
| 1 December 2026 | service voucher bonus (JSC 322.01), automatically by the fund |
| December | most bonuses the employer pays itself, often before Christmas |
| from 20 December 2026 | SFTL, road haulage and logistics (JC 140.03) |
| from 4 January 2027 | temp workers without a union, by the fund (JC 322) |
| from 4 January 2027 | hairdressing and beauty care, by the fund (JC 314) |
| by 31 January 2027 at the latest | hospitality, by the Horeca fund (JC 302) |
For a bonus you pay yourself, also check the condition "employed at the time of payment" or "employed on 31 December". Someone who leaves just before payment then falls under the rules for leavers, and those differ by committee.
Year end bonus in Belgium on dismissal: where the committees differ
Where you pay yourself, many agreements give a pro rata bonus to an employee dismissed by the employer, except for serious misconduct. Not all: in JSC 319.01, for example, the agreement does not exclude dismissal for serious misconduct. On resignation the rules diverge. In JC 200 an employee who resigns gets a share with at least 3 years of service, since 2026. In JC 311 he needs 5 years of service. Other agreements do not regulate resignation or an end by mutual agreement at all, and then we say so on that committee's page.
Where a fund pays, the bonus follows the pay you declared in the reference period. Leaving during the year then lowers the bonus automatically, and the employee gets it later from the fund, even after leaving. You do not put it in the final settlement.
A bonus you pay yourself belongs, when someone leaves, in the final settlement and on the social documents at dismissal.
How do you find the right joint committee?
The committee number is on every payslip and in your registration with the social security office. In case of doubt the main activity of the company decides, and blue-collar and white-collar staff often fall under two different committees. A metal company, for example, applies JC 111 to its blue-collar workers and JC 209 to its white-collar employees. How to check this is explained in our guide to finding the right joint committee.
If your committee is not in the table, that does not mean there is no bonus. We only include committees whose rules we could establish conclusively from the collective agreement or the fund's rules. For the supplementary committee for the non-profit sector (JC 337) the agreement for 2026 is not yet conclusive, which is why it is not listed yet.
What the year end bonus costs you and what the employee gets net
On a bonus you pay yourself, social security for blue-collar workers is calculated on 108%. On top of the gross bonus you pay employer contributions, for most employees 25% as the base. The employee keeps considerably less than the gross bonus, because withholding tax on an exceptional payment can reach 53.50%. How to calculate this, with examples, is in our guide to end-of-year bonus calculation.
Set the bonus aside every month. Otherwise you pay a thirteenth month in December out of one month's cash. Where a fund pays, the contributions or advances already spread that cost over the year.
What Business Centrum does for you
Business Centrum calculates the year end bonus per employee under the agreement of their committee, together with Acerta, as part of your payroll administration. We track the days treated as worked, include the bonus in the final settlement when someone leaves and give you an overview of what December will cost in the autumn.