Freelancers quit en masse as stricter tax office checks loom – DutchNews.nl

More than 150,000 businesses ceased trading in 2024 after the government promised to crack down on so-called “bogus freelancers”.

Figures from the statistics agency CBS showed that around 6% of all companies were deregistered during the year, a 27% increase on the previous year and the highest number since 2007, when the current calculation method was introduced.

Nine out of 10 companies that folded had only one employee, known as zzp’ers (zelfstandigen zonder personeel), the CBS said.

Last year the tax office said it would step up checks on self-employed workers from this year to see if they were genuinely independent and take steps against companies that hired freelance workers to do staff jobs, for which different tax rates apply.

The CBS said there had been a small increase in the number of bankruptcies, with 0.13% of all companies going out of business last year.

Government financial support during the pandemic lockdowns drove down the bankruptcy rate, which is now back at the level in 2020. The proportion of all companies that ceased trading was slightly higher in 2020 and 2022, while in 2016 6.4% of all businesses stopped.