Luxembourg, Belgium Ease Remote-Work Limits As Virus Spreads

Luxembourg and Belgium will allow cross-border workers to work from home amid the spread of coronavirus, an easing of the tax treaty between the two countries.

Typically cross-border workers in Luxembourg and Belgium are allowed to work outside of their primary country of employment for no more than 24 days before the primary country loses its right to tax them.

• Due to the “exceptional circumstances” of the virus forcing workers to work from home, the countries will no longer count time spent working from home toward that calculation, a spokesman for the Belgian Ministry of Finance said Tuesday.
• The change was first announced Monday evening. The measures will remain in place indefinitely.

• The measures were announced as workers across Europe are urged to work from home when possible to avoid the spread of the coronavirus. In 2018, Luxembourg had more than 46,000 cross-border workers from Belgium, according to the Luxembourgish statistics authority.

• Luxembourg’s Finance Minister Pierre Gramegna said Monday that he reached out to the Belgian, French, and German finance ministers to address this problem and was confident an agreement with France will soon follow.