Belgium has one of the more complex working time frameworks in the EU. The Labour Act of 16 March 1971 is still the core text, layered with collective agreements at the sectoral and company level. Here's what the law actually says - and what it means for day-to-day management.

The Standard Week

38 hours. Not 40 - Belgium reduced its statutory week from 40 to 38 hours in stages and that figure has held since 2003. Your employment contracts, schedules, and pay calculations should all anchor to 38, not 40.

Daily maximum: 8 hours. Certain sectors can derogate from this through sectoral CLA (collective labour agreement), but the default is 8.

Overtime Thresholds

Overtime is any time worked above 8 hours per day or above the weekly norm.

The maximum average working time - including overtime - is 48 hours per week over a reference period, in line with EU Directive 2003/88/EC.

Belgium also has a specific "internal limit": you can accumulate a maximum of 143 overtime hours per year (called the "internal counter" or crédit d'heures). These hours can be compensated via time off rather than pay. If they're not recovered by the end of the year or a set deadline, they must be paid out.

From 2023, Belgium introduced the option of a 4-day working week: an employee can work 38 hours across 4 days instead of 5, by mutual agreement. This doesn't create overtime - it's a schedule restructuring. Worth knowing if your employees start asking.

Overtime Pay

Two mandatory rates:

  • 50% supplement for overtime on weekdays and Saturday
  • 100% supplement for overtime on Sunday

Sunday work requires authorisation in most sectors. Retail, hospitality, and transport have specific rules.

Rest Periods

  • 11 consecutive hours of rest between shifts
  • 35 consecutive hours of weekly rest (must include Sunday by default; derogations exist for certain sectors)

Breaks: employees working more than 6 hours in a row are entitled to a break. The length depends on sectoral agreement, but the minimum is 15 minutes.

Penalties

Belgium uses a four-level sanction system for labour law violations. Breaching working time rules falls under Level 3 or Level 4:

  • Level 3: fines from €800 to €8,000 per worker (or criminal prosecution)
  • Level 4: fines from €1,600 to €16,000 per worker (reserved for the most serious breaches, such as systematic overtime without consent)

The Social Inspection Service (Service d'inspection sociale) and the Labour Auditor (Auditorat du Travail) both have enforcement powers. Joint checks with the police are common in hospitality and construction.

What Trips Up Belgian Employers

The 38-hour baseline catches people off guard when hiring from abroad or scaling from a smaller company. Managers who assume 40 hours is standard will miscalculate pay, overtime thresholds, and part-time ratios.

The internal overtime counter also causes issues. Teams accumulate hours during peak periods without anyone tracking whether those hours will be recovered in time. At year-end, you're suddenly facing payouts that weren't budgeted.

Track hours weekly. Know where each employee stands on their internal counter. Flag Sundays and public holiday shifts separately - the pay rate doubles and the authorisation requirements are different.

Rezano gives you real-time overtime dashboards and daily/weekly reports per employee. It flags Sunday shifts and generates the data you need for payroll. Setup takes under 10 minutes. Try it at rezano.lv.