New thresholds for attachment or assignment from 1 January
March 2022 – If an employee has debts, a creditor may approach his or her employer and ask him or her to pay part of the salary directly, without going through the employee. However, this attachment is subject to thresholds, which are indexed each year.
Types of attachment
Traditionally, a distinction is made between execution and protective attachment. As you can tell from the name, in the case of a protective attachment, the employer must block the sums concerned and cannot pay them to the employee. In the case of execution, he must not only block the sums, but also pay them to the creditor who is entitled to them.
The assignment of wages will often be the result of an agreement between the worker and a third party (e.g. a financing organisation), whereby the worker transfers ownership of the assignable part of his wages. This provider of funds thus becomes the owner of the wage and, from the outset, a creditor of the employer.
What is a wage?
The Judicial Code describes wages as the sums paid in execution of a contract of employment, apprenticeship, statute, subscription and those paid to persons who, otherwise than under a contract of employment, perform work under the authority of another person in return for remuneration, as well as holiday pay paid under the annual holiday legislation.
This includes, for example
the actual salary (after deduction of social security contributions, withholding tax and other deductions such as group insurance) ;
commissions; and
pay in lieu of notice;
end-of-year bonuses or the thirteenth month; and
holiday pay.
But unemployment benefits, benefits paid by the Life Security Fund, incapacity benefits, career break benefits, etc. also fall under this definition.
The Judicial Code also specifies what cannot be seized, namely: family allowances, interventions granted to disabled persons, amounts paid by the PCSW, etc.
Limits
There is a ceiling on the amount that can be seized. In order to guarantee the worker a minimum income, a percentage of the salary cannot be blocked. This percentage depends on the level of income. The threshold below which the salary is completely unseizable or non-transferable is indexed each year.
From 1 January 2022, the applicable salary thresholds are as follows. We mention the net monthly income in 2022, in euros, and then the seizable or assignable percentage of professional or replacement income :
Professional income :
up to 1 186: 0% ;
from 1 186,01 to 1 274: 20%;
from 1,274,01 to 1 406: 30%;
from 1 406,01 to 1 538: 40%;
over 1 538: 100%.
Replacement income :
up to 1 186: 0% ;
from 1 186,01 to 1 274: 20%;
from 1 274,01 to 1 538: 40%;
over 1 538: 100%.
These earnings thresholds are increased by 73 euros per dependent child.
A child is a dependant if the income of that child in 2020, depending on his or her status, remains below the following amounts
cohabitant: 3 340 euros ;
single person: 4 825 euros;
disabled child: 6 117 euros.
Coronavirus
In 2020 and early 2021, the thresholds for seizure were temporarily increased by 20% as part of a better protection against the economic consequences of the coronavirus crisis. This increase is no longer applicable since 1 October 2021.
