Moving to the Netherlands for a job: your first four months
Three deadlines decide how smoothly you land: register within 5 days, apply for the 30% ruling within 4 months, take out health insurance within 4 months. Put in your dates and salary below and you get all three on one timeline, plus an estimate of what the expat scheme is worth to you.
Your first four months, with real dates
Arrival and start date give you the deadlines. Your salary offer shows whether the expat scheme applies and roughly what it is worth.
Assumes the allowance comes out of the agreed salary, which is how most Dutch offers are written. The 2027 salary line goes up too; the exact amount is set at the end of 2026. Your employer files the application with you.
An estimate based on the Belastingdienst’s 2026 figures, not tax advice. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
The 30% ruling is now the expat scheme, and it shrinks in 2027
Your employer can pay part of your salary tax-free to cover the extra cost of moving here. These are the rules for 2026.
Started on the scheme before 2024? You keep 30% until your five years run out.
Your taxable salary, after the tax-free part, must be above €48,013 in 2026. Under 30 with a master’s degree the line is €36,497.
In the two years before you start, you lived more than 150 km from the Dutch border for more than 16 months. Living in Belgium or western Germany often falls inside that radius.
Apply with your employer within 4 months of your first working day and it applies from day one. Later, and it only starts the month after you apply.
The tax-free part is capped at 30% of €262,000 in 2026. In 2027 that becomes 27% of €273,000, or €73,710. The scheme lasts up to five years.
The salary lines behind every Dutch offer
Annual amounts for 2026. The skilled migrant lines decide whether you get a residence permit through your employer; the expat scheme lines decide whether part of your pay can be tax-free.
Skilled migrant amounts are the IND’s monthly figures × 12, gross, without holiday pay; EU citizens do not need a permit. Expat scheme lines are measured on taxable salary after the tax-free allowance.
Four clauses to read before you sign
The probation period. Two months at most on a permanent contract, one month on a temporary contract between six months and two years, none on six months or less. Either side can end it on the spot.
Your notice period. One month, ending at the end of a calendar month, unless the contract or CAO sets another. Your employer’s is longer the longer you stay.
Fixed-term contracts. After three in a row, or three years, the next one is permanent by law. A gap of more than six months resets the count.
The collective agreement for your sector. If one applies, it sets pay scales and often adds a 13th month, extra leave or a pension scheme. Ask which CAO covers your job.
On leave: you build up at least four times your weekly hours per year, so 160 hours on a 40-hour week, plus at least 8% holiday allowance. Many employers give more. If you ever need to resign, our Dutch page on the ontslagbrief has a calculator for your last working day.
Your loonstrook, line by line
Dutch payslips use Dutch words even at English-speaking employers. These are the lines that matter.
Income tax in 2026: 35.75% up to €38,883, 37.56% up to €78,426, 49.50% above that, before tax credits. Want to see your own numbers? The Dutch bruto-netto calculator works without a word of Dutch: fill in the gross amount.
What Dutch recruiters expect from your CV
One or two pages. A few lines of profile, then work experience with results you can count. Long introductions get skipped.
Common, not required. Date of birth, nationality and marital status can stay off. Do mention your work permit status if you need one.
Ad in English, CV in English. Ad in Dutch, CV in Dutch, unless the ad says otherwise. Add your Dutch level honestly, even if it is A1.
The cover letter (sollicitatiebrief) is short and to the point: why this job, why you, in about half a page.
Our examples are in Dutch, but the structure works in either language: pick your profession in the CV examples, or read how to write a CV in English for the Dutch market in the English CV guide.
Questions newcomers ask
You get it when you register with your municipality, which you must do within 5 days of arriving if you stay longer than 4 months. Many municipalities hand it over at the appointment; some post it afterwards. Book the appointment before you travel, because the waiting time is usually the bottleneck.
By law you get at least 8% of your gross annual salary as holiday allowance, usually paid in May or June. Most offers quote the salary without it, but some say "including holiday allowance". Ask which one yours is, because it is a difference of a month’s pay.
Possibly, but earlier time living or working here is deducted from the maximum of five years, and you still have to meet the 150 km rule: more than 16 of the 24 months before your start outside a 150 km radius from the Dutch border.
You apply together, on one form, within 4 months of your first working day. The Belastingdienst decides within about 8 weeks. Your employer then pays the allowance tax-free through payroll and has to check every year that your salary stays above the line.
One month, counted to the end of a calendar month, unless your contract or CAO says otherwise. A resignation that arrives on 31 March ends your job on 30 April; one that arrives on 1 April ends it on 31 May. In your probation period you can stop the same day.
Sources
Written with the help of AI and checked against the sources above. General information, not tax or legal advice; for your own situation, check with the Belastingdienst or an adviser.
Applying for jobs here?
Start from a CV that already follows Dutch conventions. Pick your profession and adapt the example.