Budgeting of fair compensation in the case of an employee who is also a statutory director

By Klaas Wiersma

Since the introduction of the WWZ (Work and Security Act) in 2015, we have received a new severance payment: the fair compensation. The Supreme Court made several judgments in 2017 and 2018, which makes it much clearer in which cases a fair compensation must be granted and how the level of fair compensation must be determined (also read our BenefitsBit from a few months ago, and our news items from February 2017 and May 2017 ).

How is the fair compensation budgeted in the case of an employee who is also a statutory director? A recent case illustrates which viewpoints play a role, and how it can be judged differently in the first and second instance. In the first instance, the Northern Netherlands District Court reached a fair compensation of € 60,000 gross ( ECLI: NL: RBNNE: 2017: 2726 ). In the second instance, the Court of Appeal in Arnhem-Leeuwarden paid an equitable remuneration of € 70,000 gross ( ECLI: NL: GHARL: 2018: 5773 ). Klaas Wiersma has written an annotation to this last statement, in which he analyzes the course of the dismissal procedure and points to a number of important points for attention.