Contract and freelance recruitment finds and places IT, engineering and business freelancers for a defined period rather than permanently. In Belgium that means choosing between three legally distinct routes, and one of them is only available for six specific reasons set out in law. We place across 11 countries, and the route that works here is not always the one next door.
The legal reasons for which agency work is permitted in Belgium, each with its own duration cap. Outside them it cannot be used, whatever the commercial need.
Agency worker, self-employed, or consultant on a provider's payroll. Not interchangeable.
The joint committee governing agency work, with its own pay and indexation rules.
Route and structure advice
Which of the three fits, and why it fits.
Sourcing and direct approach
Freelance markets do not answer adverts.
Screening and references
On delivery history, not on a CV layout.
Day rate benchmarking
By profile and seniority, kept current.
Contracting and documentation
Written and signed before work starts.
Motif and duration tracking
Where agency work is the chosen route.
Assignment follow-up
Through extensions and to the end date.
The right route
Most problems with external staff start at the beginning, when nobody decided whether this was agency work, self-employment or a service contract. Getting that question answered first costs nothing and prevents most of what follows.
Speed without shortcuts
Contract profiles move in days, not weeks, which is exactly why the paperwork gets skipped. We keep the speed and put the documentation in place before the first day rather than after the first invoice.
Rates you can defend internally
A day rate benchmarked by profile and seniority, so procurement is comparing your offer against the market rather than against last year's rate for a different person.
Clean exits
Assignments that end on the date they were meant to, with notice handled and no tacit extension discovered three months later. The end of a contract is the part people plan least and regret most.
Freelance | Agency worker | Consultant | Permanent | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Who employs | Nobody, they are self-employed | The agency, not you | The provider employs them | You do, directly |
| Duration limits | None set by law | Six motifs, each capped | None set by law | None, it is open-ended |
| Status risk | Yours to manage and document | None, an employee by law | The provider's, not yours | None, they are your employee |
| What you may direct | The outcome, not the hours | Day to day work, safely | The deliverable, through the provider | Everything, they are yours |
| Fits when | Specialist work with a defined scope | Replacement, peaks, or insertion | Project work with a real scope | The need is not actually temporary |
That is the most common answer, and the most expensive one. Send us three contracts.
Brief and route decision
What the work is, how long it runs, who will direct it, and therefore which of the three routes applies.
Sourcing and screening
Direct approach into the freelance market, then references on delivery rather than on job titles.
Contracting and paperwork
Rate agreed, scope written, instructions documented where required, and signed before day one.
Assignment and exit
Check-ins during the assignment, extensions treated as decisions, and an end date that is planned rather than reached. On the agency route we track the motif and its duration cap, so nothing outruns its legal basis.
The legal reasons for which agency work is permitted in Belgium, each with its own duration cap. Outside them it cannot be used, whatever the commercial need.
Agency worker, self-employed, or consultant on a provider's payroll. Not interchangeable.
The joint committee governing agency work, with its own pay and indexation rules.
Cloud, DevOps and SRE
Largely a freelance market, where a good profile is gone in a week.
Software and application
Long assignments and repeated extensions, which is where tacit renewal creeps in.
Cybersecurity and risk
Incident and programme work that starts urgently, so the route gets decided afterwards.
Data and business intelligence
Project-shaped work, which makes it the best candidate for a real service contract.
Mechanical and structural
Site phases set the dates, and site supervision complicates the status question.
Finance and controlling
Closing-period peaks, the textbook case for the temporary increase motif.
Financial services
External technology work now carries a regulatory question on top of the labour one.
Automotive and manufacturing
Production peaks are the clearest legal basis for agency work, and the easiest to document.
Energy and utilities
Site-based work under client supervision, which pulls the status question towards employment.
Tell us what the work is, how long it runs and who will direct it. We will tell you which route applies, what it costs, and how quickly we can fill it.
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