From 2027 you need to be able to show when your team worked.

What exactly was decided

Every employer — private sector and public sector alike — must have an objective, reliable and accessible system for registering the daily working time of every employee.

Those three words do not come from Belgium. They come from a 2019 judgment of the European Court of Justice, which held that the European rules on working time are only enforceable if that working time is actually measured. Until now, Belgium had not fully aligned its legislation with it.

Who it applies to

To all employers, whatever their size or sector. There is no threshold for small businesses.

That is precisely why this affects so many practices: among employers with more than a hundred staff, around three quarters already register the hours. Among businesses with fewer than ten employees, well over ninety percent do not yet.

When

1 January 2027. For those without a suitable system on that date, a transitional arrangement is expected to run until the end of the first quarter — making 31 March 2027 the hard deadline. That applies on condition that the law is passed in time.

What counts as a valid system

More than you would think. A classic time clock is not compulsory. The legislator wants the obligation to be as flexible as possible and imposes no specific system.

A tablet at the door, a badge, software, a mobile app or a system adapted to flexible working hours: all of it is possible, as long as it is objective, reliable and accessible.

What will not be enough

One thing is clear: a system that derives the hours automatically from the roster is not enough. It has to be about working time actually performed, not time planned.

A sheet of paper in a drawer is, in practice, hard to defend as accessible and reliable.

Retention

The registered data should have to be kept for five years. That means it is worth thinking in advance about who gets access, how the data is stored, and how long it stays consultable — also in the light of the GDPR.

What does not change

The existing registration obligations simply remain. Think of time tracking under flexible working hours, the registration of deviations for additional work by part-timers, and performance sheets in sectors such as transport. The new rule comes on top of them.

Honestly, what is not settled yet

At the time of writing, the law had not yet been definitively passed. The precise arrangements — exceptions, enforcement, penalties — are still being worked out. Employers' organisations have been critical of the administrative burden.

What that means in practice: the date and the principle are settled enough to prepare for. The details are not. We are following it and will adapt Taply where needed.

Last reviewed: 27 August 2026. This is not legal advice — for your specific situation, your social secretariat is the right party to talk to.

What you can already do

There is no need to wait for the final text.

• Map out how work actually happens at your place. Do the hours regularly differ from the formal roster?
• Check whether your current way of keeping track is objective and reliable, or rather a reconstruction after the fact.
• Think about who gets access to the data, and how long you keep it.
• Amend your work rules when you introduce a system.

If you register nothing today, better not to wait until December 2026. Installing a system takes an afternoon. Changing habits takes longer.

Where Taply fits in

Taply is one way to meet that obligation: a tablet at the door, a badge or PIN, and an export at the end of the month. We come by and install it.

It is not the only way, and for some organisations something else suits better. Want to know whether it suits you? Let us come by for half an hour. We will honestly say yes or no.