Stricter Conditions of the NOW 3 Set Aside
On 9 December 2020, the Dutch government announced that the Third Emergency Bridge Measure for Conservation of Work (
Derde Tijdelijke Noodmaatregel Overbrugging voor Werkbehoud) (the
NOW 3), which consists of three phases between October 2020 and June 2021, will not be augmented for the second phase. NOW 3 is a scheme that provides for compensation to employers of wage costs in the event of significant (20/30%) turnover loss compared to the year 2019 due to Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). The phases of the NOW 3 are as follows:
1 October 2020 – 31 December 2020 (
NOW 3.1)
NOW 3.2)
NOW 3.3)
The government announced that NOW 3.2 will be consistent with NOW 3.1. NOW 3.2 was initially planned to be stricter than NOW 3.1, with the turnover loss threshold during NOW 3.2 to be raised from 20% to 30% and the compensation of the wage costs to be a maximum of 70% instead of 80% of the total wage sum (capped per employee at EUR 9,538 g