At some point you can't manage alone anymore: the yard grows, the number of horses increases, and you need hands for daily care or an instructor alongside you. The choice between taking someone on as an employee or hiring them as a freelancer (zzp'er — a self-employed contractor with no staff of their own) determines your costs, your risk, and your administration. This overview sets out the main lines; for your final decision, bring in an accountant or an employment lawyer.
First the Question: Fixed Role or One-Off Job
Before you think about employment or freelance, look at the nature of the work. That largely determines which form fits legally.
- Structural work that sits at the heart of your business — daily feeding, mucking out, getting horses ready, fixed lesson hours. This closely resembles an employment relationship: fixed tasks, fixed hours, under your direction.
- Temporary or specialized jobs — a farrier, a physiotherapist, a jumping trainer brought in once a week, vacation or peak-season help. This lends itself more to hiring a freelancer.
The more a role resembles a regular job (fixed hours, your instructions, no entrepreneurial risk of their own), the harder it is to hire that person as a freelancer without tax risk. That distinction is the core of everything below.
Employment: More Security, but More Obligations
If you take someone on as an employee, you become an employer with all the accompanying duties. You sign an employment contract (fixed-term or permanent), withhold payroll tax, and pay social security contributions.
Broadly budget for these items on top of the gross salary:
| Item | What It Is |
|---|---|
| Employer costs | Social security contributions and employer contributions on top of the gross salary |
| Holiday pay | Typically around 8% of annual salary |
| Continued pay during illness | You keep paying salary during illness for an extended period |
| Pension | Mandatory if a collective labor agreement (cao) or sector scheme requires it |
| Administration | Payroll administration, tax filings, insurance |
Total employer costs therefore sit noticeably above the bare gross salary — often roughly 25 to 35 percent higher, depending on the situation. Set against that, you have someone permanent: available, trained in, and you get to direct the work as you want. For the daily care of a growing yard, that's often exactly what you need.
Check whether a cao (a collective labor agreement negotiated between employers and unions) applies. For horse businesses, sector agreements — for example in the agricultural or animal-keeping sector — can prescribe pay scales and employment conditions. Check which cao applies to your business with an employers' organization or an employment lawyer.
Hiring a Freelancer: Flexible, but Watch for False Self-Employment
Hiring a freelancer feels simpler: you agree on a rate, get an invoice, and have no payroll administration or continued pay during illness. For a genuine independent contractor — someone with multiple clients, their own business, and their own entrepreneurial risk — that's a fine setup.
The risk lies in false self-employment (schijnzelfstandigheid): you hire someone as a freelancer, but in practice that person works as an employee. Fixed days at your yard, your instructions, no other clients, no risk of their own. In that case, the Belastingdienst (the Dutch Tax Administration) can reclassify the relationship as an employment relationship after the fact. The consequences can be substantial: back assessments of payroll tax and contributions, sometimes with a penalty, and that bill lands on you as the client.
The line between genuine independence and a disguised employment relationship comes down to a few questions:
- Is there a relationship of authority? Do you determine how, when, and where the work happens, or does the person you hired?
- Does the person have to do the work themselves, or may they send a substitute?
- Does the person hired carry entrepreneurial risk, and do they have multiple clients?
The more the work resembles a regular job, the greater the risk. The rules and enforcement around this change periodically; consult the Belastingdienst for the current state of play, and set out the agreements in a contract that matches the actual situation. A freelance arrangement on paper that doesn't match practice won't protect you.
Employment or Freelance: A Quick Comparison
A rule of thumb, not a watertight test:
| Employment | Hiring a Freelancer | |
|---|---|---|
| Fits | Fixed, daily, directed work | Temporary or specialized jobs |
| Cost | Gross salary + employer costs | Hourly rate, often higher per hour |
| Flexibility | Lower (notice rules, dismissal) | Higher (per assignment) |
| Administration | Payroll administration, tax filings | Invoice, no payroll tax withholding |
| Main risk | Fixed costs even with less work | False self-employment + back assessment |
For the core of your business — daily care — employment is usually the safer choice, and often the more stable one over time. For peak periods, vacation cover, and specialist work, hiring freelancers makes more sense. Many yards combine both: one or two permanent staff plus freelance hires where needed.
Other Forms: Temp Agency, Intern, On-Call Worker
There's more between employment and freelance than you'd think.
- Temp agency worker or payrolling — an agency is formally the employer and places someone to work for you. More expensive per hour, but without you carrying the employer risk. Useful when you're unsure, or for temporary growth.
- Intern — a student from an equestrian or agricultural vocational program. Make sure the internship genuinely aims at learning and isn't a disguised source of cheap labor; there are rules governing this.
- On-call or zero-hours contract — still employment, but with flexible deployment. On-call contracts now come with a fair number of rules (notice periods for call-outs, the right to fixed hours after a certain time), so check the current conditions.
Which form fits depends on how fixed and how much work you have. Don't start bigger than you can oversee, and expand as the yard grows steadily.
Getting Started: A Workable Order
Before you bring someone on board, in this order:
- Determine the nature of the work — structural and directed, or temporary and independent. This drives the whole choice.
- Choose the form together with an accountant or an employment lawyer, not by gut feeling. The tax consequences of a wrong choice land on you afterward.
- Check the cao and sector rules that may apply to a horse business.
- Put the agreements in writing — an employment contract or a contractor agreement that matches the actual situation.
- Arrange the administration and insurance — payroll administration for employees, and liability cover that also includes hired or agency staff.
The choice between employment and freelance isn't a formality but a business decision with a tax and legal tail. Treat it just as seriously as the training work itself, and get advice beforehand instead of correcting course after the fact.
See also: VAT and Tax for Horse Businesses · Starting a Training or Trading Stable · Insurance for a Riding School or Horse Business · Glossary for this level