Wage Attachment in the Netherlands (Loonbeslag) and the Beslagvrije Voet

Wage attachment (loonbeslag) is the point where an unpaid debt reaches directly into a paycheque. A creditor who has won a court judgment can instruct a bailiff (gerechtsdeurwaarder) to order the debtor's employer to pay part of the wage to the bailiff instead of to the debtor.

The mechanism is often described as absolute, but Dutch law caps it hard. Every wage attachment must leave the debtor a protected minimum, the beslagvrije voet, that a creditor can never reach.

This page explains who can order loonbeslag, how the protected minimum is set, why it rests on official income data rather than a figure anyone types in, and where an individual amount can be checked.

Information last verified on 22 July 2026. This page provides general legal information about Netherlands law and does not constitute legal advice in an individual case.

What loonbeslag is, and who can order it

Loonbeslag is a form of enforcement (executie), so it comes at the end of a process rather than the start. Before a creditor can touch wages it needs an enforceable title (executoriale titel): usually a judgment from a court, sometimes a notarial deed.

A creditor cannot carry out the attachment itself. It instructs a bailiff (gerechtsdeurwaarder), a public officer who serves the attachment on the employer. From that moment the employer becomes the third party under attachment (derde-beslagene) and must pay the attachable part of the wage to the bailiff.

The employer has no discretion once the attachment is served. Paying the full wage to the employee no longer discharges the debt for the attached part, so the employer follows the bailiff's instruction or risks paying twice.

How a debt reaches this stage

A wage attachment is usually the last step in a longer chain. An unpaid consumer bill first goes through a reminder and out-of-court collection, then to court for a judgment, and only then to a bailiff for enforcement.

The consumer protection at the collection stage is worth stating, because it limits what can be added to the debt before it ever reaches enforcement.

Before a consumer owes any out-of-court collection costs (buitengerechtelijke incassokosten), the creditor must first send a payment reminder (aanmaning) giving at least 14 days to pay, with the 14 days counted from the day after the reminder is received (artikel 6:96 lid 6 BW). Collection costs charged without that letter are not owed by a consumer.

The beslagvrije voet: the minimum the law protects

The beslagvrije voet is the amount of monthly income that stays out of reach of any attachment. It is not a discount the debtor has to request: the bailiff must calculate and apply it, and an attachment served without a correct beslagvrije voet is defective.

The starting point is deliberately generous. Artikel 475da lid 2 Rv sets the base at 95% of the applicable social-assistance norm (the Participatiewet norm for the household), not 90%, and then adds components for the healthcare allowance (zorgtoeslag) and the rent allowance (huurtoeslag), with a further component for households with children.

Whatever that formula produces can never exceed a ceiling set for each household type. Those ceilings are the caps in artikel 475da lid 1 Rv.

These are the maximum protected amounts (beslagvrije voet) in force from 1 July 2026; they are re-set on 1 January and 1 July each year. The amount actually left to a specific person is usually lower and depends on income and allowances, and is calculated by the bailiff from official income data. To check an individual figure, use the official government tool at uwbeslagvrijevoet.nl.

How much of a wage can actually be taken

A worked example shows why the cap is not the whole story. Suppose a single person (alleenstaande) nets EUR 2,500 a month, and the bailiff calculates a beslagvrije voet of EUR 1,800 for that household and income. That EUR 1,800 is an illustration, not a computation for any real case.

Only the income above the protected amount can be attached. Here that is EUR 2,500 less EUR 1,800, so EUR 700 a month goes to the bailiff and EUR 1,800 stays with the debtor. If the same person earned only EUR 1,700, nothing could be attached from wages at all, because the whole amount sits below the protected minimum.

The cap is a second, separate limit on the protected amount. For this single person the beslagvrije voet can never be set above EUR 2,208.48, the ceiling from 1 July 2026, however the underlying formula comes out.

Why the figure comes from official income data

The most important feature of loonbeslag is that the debtor does not report their own income for the calculation. Artikel 475d lid 1 Rv bases the beslagvrije voet on the debtor's taxable income as it appears in the UWV polisadministratie, the national payroll register, unless that figure is not a realistic reflection of actual income.

This is why a self-typed gross salary cannot reproduce the bailiff's figure, and why this page does not offer a calculator that would. The income basis, the allowance curves and several per-case adjustments all feed into a number the bailiff derives from official data.

The calculation is also not redone every month. Under artikel 475d lid 2 Rv the beslagvrije voet, once set, holds for twelve months, and is recalculated earlier only on a structural change of circumstances.

Special situations

A debtor living abroad

Someone with no registered address in the Netherlands is treated differently. Artikel 475da lid 4 Rv sets the beslagvrije voet at 47.5% of the couple norm (the artikel 21 onderdeel b Participatiewet norm) for a debtor without a Dutch woonadres, adjusted where the person has a fixed residence in another country.

A partner's income

The household is taken into account, not just the debtor alone. Artikel 475db Rv reduces the beslagvrije voet by a partner's own non-attached periodic income, up to at most half of the beslagvrije voet, so the protection reflects what the household already receives.

Money in a bank account

Attachment can also reach a bank balance, and the protected minimum follows the money there too. Under artikel 475a Rv an attachment on money a private person holds at a bank is valid only for the part above one month's worth of the same lid 1 caps, so a basic monthly balance is shielded much as wages are.

If the protected amount looks wrong

The beslagvrije voet is the bailiff's responsibility, and it can be corrected. If it has been set too low, the debtor can give the bailiff up-to-date information about income and household, and the bailiff must recalculate; the tool at uwbeslagvrijevoet.nl gives a reference figure to compare against.

Loonbeslag is the enforcement of a debt for which a title already exists, not a consumer-sale dispute, so the rule that routes consumer purchases to the kantonrechter regardless of the amount does not apply to the attachment itself. Which court hears any wider dispute depends on the nature of the underlying claim.

Related pages

Loonbeslag sits inside the wider Dutch consumer and debt framework. For the statutory guarantee on faulty goods see warranty rights in the Netherlands, and for cancelling a distance purchase see the right of withdrawal. The broader structure of Dutch law is set out on Netherlands law.