From 1 January 2026, the fixed standard amount for the DGA’s customary salary increases to €58,000 per year. In 2024 and 2025, it was €56,000.
Sounds like a minor correction. In practice, it’s often the starting gun for debates with payroll, cashflow planning—and if you ignore it, the Dutch Tax Administration.
Executive summary
The customary salary is not “pick something around the standard amount.” It’s the highest of three benchmarks.
In 2026, the minimum standard amount is €58,000 (unless you can convincingly substantiate that a lower salary is customary).
The real pain is rarely the extra €2,000. The real pain is weak substantiation and bad internal consistency (dividends high, salary “coincidentally” low).
Let’s make it precise: what is the “customary salary”?
In plain language, the customary salary rules say:
If you work in your own BV (or cooperative) and you hold a substantial interest, then a salary “belongs” to that, one that matches the level and extent of your work.
And that salary must be at least the highest of:
The salary from the most comparable employment
The salary of the highest-paid employee (including at a related company)
The standard amount: €58,000 in 2026
So the third one—the standard amount, isn’t “advice.” It’s a floor. But sometimes your real minimum is higher because benchmark 1 or 2 comes out higher.
What exactly changes in 2026?
Only the standard amount moves:
2024/2025: €56,000
2026: €58,000
But that “small” shift has an outsized impact because many DGA’s park their salary at exactly that standard amount for years. Then 2026 suddenly becomes a payroll adjustment you have to make.
The trap: thinking €58,000 is automatically “safe”
The standard amount is only the answer if it is also the highest number of the three.
Classic example:
Your BV employs an operations manager on €72,000. Then €72,000 is your minimum (benchmark 2), even though the standard amount is €58,000.
And yes: the discussion “but they do different work” is real. You just don’t win it with gut feeling. You win it with job profiles, hours, responsibilities, and documentation.
Can you go below €58,000 in 2026?
Sometimes. But “sometimes” is not a strategy.
The Tax Administration is explicit: if, for comparable work, it is customary for others to receive a lower salary, and you can make that plausible, then the salary can be set at that lower level.
Also:
If the customary salary is €5,000 or less and you can prove it, you report the actual salary, but note: that €5,000 threshold applies to the total of your work for all companies in which you hold a substantial interest.
The “start-up minimum salary” relaxation has been discontinued for new cases from 2023 onwards (with limited transitional rules for those who started in 2021/2022).
The bottom line: lower is possible, but only if your file is stronger than your preference.
Finally: this isn’t a salary issue. It’s governance.
Customary salary is one of those rules the Tax Administration feels zero romance about. You can treat it as an administrative nuisance, or as a governance tool:
a salary that is right, fits the reality, and is defensible.
