Hybrid working gained momentum with the corona crisis. Cross-border employment relationships may experience issues with regard to the applicable social security system with a corresponding impact on the employee benefit plans regarding pension, disability and health care coverage for your employees.
However, a new European framework agreement ensures that teleworking by frontier workers will be facilitated as of July 1, 2023. Employees who telework less than 50% of their working hours in their country of residence will - provided certain conditions are met - remain subject to the social security system of their country of work. This is good news, because it means the collective plans for this group of workers can be maintained.
The minimum guaranteed return on supplementary pensions has been 1.75% since 2016. On 1 January 2025, following this long period at a constant level, the statutory guaranteed return will rise to 2.50%. What impact does this increase have on your company’s pension schemes?
By means of global benefits management, your organisation can easily run a strong employee benefits package worldwide. This structured, central approach provides a useful overview of all benefits and enables you to put together an attractive package in the war for talent. If social security is non-existent or too limited in one of the countries where you’re based, you can also provide your employees there with additional support through this insurance package. Employee benefits expert Kristof Baertsoen talks about the advantages of global benefits management in the latest episode of our video podcast Succes Verzekerd.
From 1 November 2024, hospitalisation insurance will cover the costs of a suicide attempt. The law of 21 April 2024 has amended existing health cost insurance legislation to this end.
Since 2019, local authorities have been encouraged to introduce or develop a supplementary pension scheme for the benefit of their contractual staff. If – among other requirements – this supplementary pension scheme is large enough, meaning in practice a contribution of at least 3% to a defined contribution scheme, the local authority is eligible for a discount of up to 50% on the additional annual shortfall contribution. This discount is adjusted by the latest pension reform to maintain the financial robustness of the Common Pension Fund.