Jaaropgave / Annual Statement

If you live and work in the Netherlands, you are obliged to pay your income taxes.

Every year the Tax authorities send out an invitation to all persons, resident and/ or working in Holland and entitled to a return or required to pay extra, to complete an Income Tax Declaration. If you do not receive such an invitation you do not have to complete one. However, if you know that you have to or want to file a tax return then you will have to request this form yourself. This form has to be completed by the 1st of May.

How does it work:

Based on your Income Tax Declaration, the Dutch Tax and Customs Administration will decide whether or not you are entitled to a rebate (refund of excess paid in tax) or whether you have to pay extra, due to insufficient tax having been paid.
This assessment and amount you are refunded, or must pay, is based on a number of things: your income, property you own and your personal situation throughout the past year.
To submit your Income tax declaration you will need to provide a statement concerning your income. This “statement” or “Jaaropgave” is provided every year by your employer(s). This is a summary of your salary earned over the past year and will be automatically sent to you by your (former) employer(s). Your Jaaropgave for the period you have worked via Undutchables, will be published on your portal from the first week of February. An explanation of this yearly statement can be found here.

Short explanation on how to obtain your Tax Declaration:

The Tax office generally advises people to wait until March 1st to download their Tax Declaration, as by that time the Tax office has already filled in some information for you (if available from government offices).
For security reasons you will have to apply for a "DigiD"; an electronic signature which can be obtained at DigiD (can take up to 5 days!)
To download and fill in your Tax Declaration digitally, go to Income tax return on www.belastingdienst.nl. Although the site is also in English, the form itself is only available in Dutch.
You must check the information that has already been filled in, or that you fill in, very carefully, as you are responsible for ensuring that it is correctly completed.

Important:

If you migrated to the Netherlands during the course of 2013 (and were not residing in the Netherlands for the complete tax year) then you will be required to fill in the tax return form M. This form is not available digitally, request for a form M at your nearest tax office.

Tax Advice:

Please note that we are no experts on tax matters, so please contact the Tax office with any queries, or ask a Tax Expert for assistance.

If you find you need more personal advice, we suggest you go to an expert. There are many expat financial specialists who can complete your tax forms for you or provide other consultancy services.