article by
Tanel Feldman
Senior Partner at Immigration Law Associates
EU Labour and Employment Law-Immigration Partner
CORPORATE MIGRATION CENTER
Expert in Intra-EU Labour Mobility, with a special focus on the Posting/Secondment of Workers
The Netherlands is moving from the existing regulatory framework for labour supply towards a statutory admission system under the Wet toelating terbeschikkingstelling van arbeidskrachten (WTTA).
Following the adoption of the legislation and the implementing timetable, the focus is now shifting from the legislative process to implementation. The WTTA will enter into force on 1 January 2027, while enforcement of the prohibition on supplying or hiring workers without the required admission will start on 1 January 2028.
For temporary work agencies, staffing companies, secondment businesses and other undertakings supplying workers in the Netherlands, 2026 and 2027 are therefore preparation and transition years.
This is particularly relevant for businesses that are already SNA-certified. Their existing certification is important for the transition, but it should not be regarded as equivalent to admission under the WTTA.
A statutory system replaces the current market structure
The fundamental change introduced by the WTTA is that access to the Dutch labour-supply market becomes subject to statutory admission.
An undertaking falling within the scope of the system will, in principle, need to be admitted before it can supply workers in the Netherlands. The obligation is mirrored on the client side: companies receiving supplied workers will have to ensure that the supplier is appropriately admitted.
The system therefore creates compliance obligations on both sides of the labour-supply relationship.
For example, a Dutch company using workers supplied by an external staffing company will no longer be able to treat the supplier’s regulatory status solely as a matter for that supplier. Once enforcement begins, the hirer must itself ensure that it obtains workers from an admitted undertaking.
Admission will be administered by the Nederlandse Autoriteit Uitleenmarkt (NAU), while designated inspection institutions will assess compliance with the applicable statutory framework.
What happens to SNA certification?
Existing SNA certification does not automatically become a WTTA admission.
Nevertheless, SNA certification has an important transitional function. The new statutory normenkader builds significantly on the existing inspection infrastructure underlying the SNA system, and the transitional arrangements specifically recognise the position of existing SNA-certified businesses.
This means that an SNA-certified supplier should normally maintain its certification during the transition rather than allowing it to lapse on the assumption that the WTTA will shortly replace it.
The practical objective should be continuity: maintain the existing compliance position while preparing for the new statutory system.
Admission involves more than an inspection certificate
Companies should also avoid viewing WTTA admission as simply a replacement certificate.
The admission framework contains several requirements. These include registration requirements, submission of a Verklaring Omtrent het Gedrag (VOG), compliance with the statutory normenkader, inspections and continuing compliance after admission.
Another significant element is financial security.
The statutory framework provides, in principle, for security of €100,000 for admission and €50,000 for provisional admission. However, the legislation also provides possibilities for established businesses to be relieved from the financial-security requirement where the relevant statutory conditions are satisfied.
An existing supplier should therefore determine its individual position before budgeting on the assumption that a €100,000 security will necessarily be required.
The first operational changes arrive in 2027
The date attracting most attention is 1 January 2028 because this is when enforcement of the admission requirement starts. However, important obligations arise earlier.
From 1 January 2027, new administrative requirements concerning the supply of workers become relevant.
Before supplying a worker, the supplier must identify that person to the hirer as a supplied worker and maintain the required information concerning the supply in its administration. The hirer has corresponding record-keeping obligations concerning the workers received and the undertaking supplying them.
For businesses handling substantial numbers of temporary or supplied workers, this is not merely a legal-documentation exercise.
Existing HR, payroll, contracting and workforce-management systems may need to be reviewed to ensure that the required information can be recorded, linked to the correct hirer and retained for the required period.
A supplier operating with several clients, for example, will need a reliable system capable of identifying not simply that an employee is employed by the supplier, but when and to which client that individual has been supplied.
The transitional regime makes the end of 2026 particularly important
The legislation includes transitional arrangements intended to avoid a situation in which existing compliant suppliers suddenly have to stop operating because their applications have not yet been processed.
According to the current implementation timetable, suppliers wishing to benefit from the transitional arrangement must register with the NAU before 1 January 2027. The registration period is scheduled to run from 1 November to 31 December 2026.
The subsequent application and inspection process must then be completed within the applicable transitional framework.
Where the statutory transitional conditions are satisfied, an existing supplier may continue operating while its application remains under consideration, rather than automatically falling under the prohibition when enforcement starts.
The transitional rules are therefore commercially important. Missing the relevant deadlines may place a supplier in a very different position from a competitor that has correctly entered the transitional system.
What should companies do now?
For an existing SNA-certified supplier, preparation can be divided into three stages.
During 2026, the company should maintain its SNA certification, assess its current compliance arrangements against the emerging WTTA normenkader, determine whether financial security will be required in its particular circumstances and prepare its internal administrative systems. It should also ensure that it is ready for the transitional registration process before the end of the year.
During 2027, attention shifts to implementation: the new administrative and record-keeping requirements must be incorporated into daily operations, and the supplier must complete the applicable inspection and admission process within the statutory timetable.
By 1 January 2028, the objective is different again. The supplier must be in a position allowing it lawfully to continue supplying workers once enforcement begins, while its clients must be able to verify that they are obtaining workers from an appropriately admitted supplier.
A broader compliance change for the Dutch labour-supply market
The WTTA should therefore not be understood simply as the replacement of SNA certification by another certificate.
It introduces a statutory market-access system combining admission, inspection, financial and administrative requirements, continuing compliance and enforcement. Importantly, the system also extends responsibility beyond staffing companies themselves by imposing obligations on the businesses that use supplied workers.
For existing SNA-certified suppliers, there is consequently no reason to wait until 2028. The relevant transition begins much earlier, and the remaining period of 2026 should be used to determine how the new admission framework affects the company’s existing structure and operations.