Tax deferral
Companies do not have to pay tax in the next three months. Affected entrepreneurs can apply for a postponement of tax without immediately sending evidence, and the collection will then stop immediately.
Self-employed persons
For self-employed persons without personnel who have run into problems, the government supplements the income to the social minimum.
The self-employed persons scheme will apply for three months. The money does not have to be repaid and the asset and partner test that normally applies will lapse. This means that the self-employed do not have to use their savings and can also receive benefits if their partner still has income. The procedure to qualify for this income support is being accelerated.
Emergency counter with 4000 euros per company
There will be an emergency counter, where the most severely affected companies can immediately receive 4000 euros to alleviate the greatest emergency. This applies to affected sectors, such as the catering industry, but also the travel sector and the cultural sector.
Working time reduction
The possibilities for employers to apply for short-time working hours for their staff are being expanded considerably and benefits are increasing.
Until now, the government will take over a maximum of 75 percent of the salary, under the new scheme that will be a maximum of 90 percent. This means that employers have to pay much less. The scheme also applies to employees with a zero-hour contract and on-call workers.
This does not change much for most employees. In most cases, the employer supplements the benefit to the full salary, and remains so.
Not every company can apply for part-time unemployment benefits. The condition is that turnover has decreased by at least 20 percent.
78,000 applications
Normally, only a few hundred companies use the option of applying for temporary unemployment benefits for employees who are out of work each year. Almost 78,000 companies have already done so in recent days, as a result of the crisis, Minister Koolmees announced. The Ministry of Social Affairs can hardly handle the influx.
Borrow easier
It will also be easier for companies to borrow money from the bank. The government guarantee scheme will be expanded from 400 million to 1.5 billion euros. The maximum loan amount per company is temporarily increased to 150 million euros. The Ministry of Economic Affairs will then guarantee half of that amount.
The government is doing everything it can to prevent companies from falling over and people from losing their jobs. However, according to Minister Hoekstra, the support package cannot solve all problems. “This is going to hurt. It’s going to be squeaky and creaky, and we can’t rule out, despite everything we do, there are companies that don’t know how to continue this.”
Billions in support is not at the expense of other government expenditures, such as healthcare and education. To help the entrepreneurs, the cabinet is prepared to increase the national debt.
The measures were announced at a press conference, check out the most important moments here:
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