Training administration: obligations, cost and proposal. Internal note for management. · 22/09/2026
Convince your management in five minutes
In one minute
- Three legal obligations with a date: the training plan (by 31 March, from 20 employees), the individual training entitlement per employee and the social balance sheet filed with the annual accounts. On top of that, the certificates your customers, your insurer or health and safety law require. Your employees and the works council can ask to see all of it, and your social balance sheet is published together with your annual accounts.
- Excel costs more than you think: hours of administration every month, missed subsidies, expired certificates and no view on the real cost of training, wage cost included.
- Training is not a cost you have to justify. Independent research on Belgian firms measures a trained employee 23 percent more productive, against 12 percent higher pay. And the government pays part of it back: up to 30 percent through the SME e-wallet and 11.75 percent of pay through the partial exemption from payment of withholding tax. You only get that money with a record per employee.
- Learnlog starts free, for every company size. Paid plans from €10 per month, billed annually. You can cancel at any time: you keep the paid features until the end of the paid year and then fall back to Free, with all your data kept. No credit card to start.
- Running in one afternoon: import employees from Excel or through the payroll provider and add training already underway. Uploading certificates and history is a few weeks of work, spread out.
- Management gets what it wants: one file you can produce immediately, figures for the annual accounts without arithmetic and a view on what training really costs.
The obligations, with their date and who can ask for them
These are not best practices. They are obligations with a date and with someone who can ask for them: your employees, the works council or union delegation, your auditor. And your social balance sheet is published together with your annual accounts.
| Obligation | Who | When | Who can ask for it | In Learnlog |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Training plan | From 20 employees, counted in full-time equivalents | Every year, by 31 March, after advice from the works council or union delegation (advice by 15 March at the latest) or, if neither exists, after presenting it to the employees. Copy filed electronically with the FPS Employment, Labour and Social Dialogue within one month of the plan taking effect, via transfer.werk.belgie.be | The works council or union delegation, your employees themselves, and the FPS Employment, which receives the copy | Plan per team and site, export for consultation and filing |
| Individual training entitlement | From 20 employees 5 days per full-time employee, at 10 to 19 employees 1 day, under 10 employees not applicable. A sector CBA may deviate but never below 2 days. Counted in full-time equivalents. | Every calendar year. Unused days carry over within a five-year period; the first runs from 2024 through 2028, after which the counter restarts. | The employee, who can ask for the state of their training credit at any time, and the works council or union delegation | Balance per employee and per joint committee, live |
| Social balance sheet | Every company with staff that files annual accounts, micro model included. For non-profits and foundations the duty applies from 20 FTE; below that you may complete the section voluntarily. A narrow group with no filing duty (certain hospitals and private-law legal entities) files a separate social balance sheet with the Central Balance Sheet Office from an average of 20 staff. | With every filing of the annual accounts | Accountant, auditor, works council. Through the Central Balance Sheet Office your social balance sheet is public, along with your annual accounts. | The training section (codes 5801 to 5853) fully completed, exportable |
| Certificates and refreshers | Anyone employing people with first aid, forklift, BA4/BA5, VCA or another competence certificate. The law itself sets an interval for the company first aider's refresher (in principle annual), for asbestos training and for code 95 continuing training (35 hours per 5 years). For other certificates you, your customer or your insurer set the interval. For the forklift the law requires adequate training to operate it safely; you set the validity period. For BA4/BA5 the certificate is not the end of it: you declare your employee competent in writing, based on a risk analysis of your installation. VCA certificates are valid for 10 years and are often a customer requirement. Note: anyone working on a temporary or mobile construction site must in any case complete basic safety training of at least 8 hours. | Before the expiry date: yearly for first aid, for the rest the period you, your customer or your insurer set | Prevention advisor, insurer, customer, and the Welfare at Work inspectorate during an inspection or after an accident | All certificates in one place. Reminder before the expiry date from Standard. |
The Federal Learning Account has been abolished since 1 January 2026 (law on various provisions of 14 January 2026). There is no longer any legal duty to register training with the government, but the obligations themselves remain: training plan, training entitlement and social balance sheet. Your employees can still ask for the state of their training credit. The Minister of Employment has also announced that the federal government and the regions will conclude cooperation agreements in 2026 for a new individual learning account from 1 January 2027. Whoever keeps records now will have nothing to reconstruct later. Training you are legally required to provide is also free for the employee and counts as working time (law of 7 October 2022).
What you do not pay yourself
The calculation above is a gross cost. This is what the government pays back, in every case on condition that you can show, per employee, who followed which training and when. That proof lives in Excel today.
| Scheme | How much | Condition | In Learnlog |
|---|---|---|---|
| Partial exemption from payment of withholding tax | 11.75 percent of that month's pay, on a wage base capped at €3,500 | 38 hours of training within an uninterrupted 75 calendar days for small companies, 76 hours within 30 calendar days for the rest. The employee has at least six months of service and the training is not imposed by law or collective agreement. | Dated training days per employee: exactly the proof your accountant asks for |
| SME e-wallet / kmo-portefeuille (Flanders) | 30 percent for small and 20 percent for medium-sized companies, up to €7,500 of support per year | Training with a registered provider, within one of the eight themes, applied for within the deadline after the training starts | Grant tracked per training, with the total already received (Standard) |
| Flemish training leave (VOV) | €24.50 per approved hour from school year 2026-2027, against €14.91 the year before | Recognised training. Personal maximum = your March employment rate × 125 hours per school year. Doubling to 250 hours is only possible through the joint right of initiative: at least two different courses, one proposed by the employer and one by the employee. Training that is mandatory by law or collective agreement for the current job does not count. | Hours registered per employee, ready for your claim |
| Paid educational leave (Brussels and Wallonia) | €21.30 per hour in Wallonia, €22.07 per hour in Brussels | Recognised training, claimed per school year with its own regional deadline | Same, per site |
Amounts and conditions as published by VLAIO, the FPS and the regions. The SME e-wallet and Flemish training leave apply to sites in Flanders; in Brussels and Wallonia paid educational leave applies. Always have your file confirmed by your accountant or payroll office.
What training returns
These are not our numbers.
more productive than firms that do not train
Research covering more than 13,000 Belgian firms: companies that train their people measure 1 to 2 percent higher productivity. Average wages rise by only 0.5 percent. The company keeps the difference.
Konings and Vanormelingen, KU Leuven, The Review of Economics and Statistics, 2015
shortage occupations in 2026
The top ten of the Flemish VDAB list includes industrial electromechanic, CNC setter-operator and industrial maintenance manager. You will not find these profiles on the market. You train them yourself, or you do without.
VDAB, 2026 shortage occupations list (Flanders)
What management gets back
One file you can produce immediately
Training plan, entitlement per employee and certificates in one place, with exports for social consultation and the FPS Employment. No digging through mailboxes when someone asks.
The social balance sheet without arithmetic
Participants, hours and net cost by gender, in the National Bank layout. The accountant gets an export, not an Excel full of formulas.
A view on what training really costs
Training cost and the wage cost of training hours, per course and per employee, against an annual budget. Finally a number to decide on.
The subsidies you forget
SME e-wallet, sector funds and the Flemish training leave reimbursement tracked per course, with the total already received. Each scheme is regional and has its own conditions; Learnlog keeps the record of what you applied for and what came in. (Standard)
No certificate that expires unnoticed
VCA, forklift, BA4/BA5, first aid: Learnlog sends the reminder before the expiry date, you schedule the refresher. Safety, insurability and customer requirements in one. (Standard)
Employees who see their own entitlement
Every employee sees their entitlement and training CV and can request training themselves. That saves HR a stack of questions, and you can see at once who you could grow internally into a role you will not fill on the market anyway.
Everything without a label works on the free plan, the social balance sheet included. Anything marked (Standard) is part of the paid plan from €10 per month. For the first 30 days you get all of it anyway.
Already used by
“It is a very easy and user-friendly programme. We are always well guided and get an answer to our questions: really well followed up.”
Sonja Craenhals · HR Manager, Hunter & Van Twist
What it costs
30 days of the full application, then automatically Free. No credit card to start. Paid plans are billed annually; you can cancel at any time and keep them until the end of the paid year.
Free is enough to start, to build the training plan and to complete the social balance sheet. Standard pays for itself the first time a subsidy is not missed or a certificate does not expire.
Unlimited employees and training, training plan, entitlement, training CV, certificates, Excel import and export.
Plus subsidy tracking, certificate expiry reminders, teams and sites, tracking of the FPS Employment filing, phone support.
Plus attendance, evaluation forms, attachments, certification matrix, API, free onboarding and integration service.
Sector fund mtech+ (JC 111 and 209) offers Learnlog to its members at €20 per month. Price by company size, excl. VAT.
What management still wants to know
- Where does our data sit?
- In the European Union. Learnlog is built in Belgium by Smart Lions (Webdoos BV, Bruges); the application and your data are hosted in a data centre in the European Union.
- Are we locked in?
- You decide whether and when you pay. Paid plans are billed annually. You can cancel at any time, but the remaining part of the year is not refunded: you keep using the paid features until the end of the period you paid for, after which the account switches to Free automatically. All your data stays in the system and remains exportable. During the trial nothing is charged.
- What if we stop?
- Your data and records stay in place, only the paid features lock. You can export everything to Excel at any time.
- What do we sign?
- The terms of service and a data processing agreement, because this is your employees' personal data.
- And if our HR manager leaves?
- Today the file lives in one Excel on one laptop and in a mailbox. In Learnlog it is in the company's name, not one person's.
How it goes
- TodayCreate the account (2 minutes). Import employees from Excel or through the payroll connection. Add training already underway.
- This monthUpload certificates, check the entitlement per employee, set the budget. This year's training plan is done.
- Before 31 MarchSubmit the draft to the works council or union delegation so their advice is in by 15 March, or present it to your employees if neither body exists. Adopt the plan by 31 March and file a copy with the FPS Employment within one month of it taking effect. With the annual accounts: export the social balance sheet.
What does Excel cost you today?
Tick what you do yourself and complete your figures. The email at the bottom and the ask to your management pick up the result; you only fill in the names. Enter your own numbers. For the hours, enter the re-typing, searching and compiling: that is the part that goes away. Grants and the withholding tax exemption are not included here; they come on top, see below.
Worked example based on your input. The difference is freed-up time expressed in wage cost, not cash. Prices excl. VAT; current prices on learnlog.be.
Copy this email to your management
Adjust the numbers and send. Attach the printed page as a PDF.
Proposal: take training administration out of Excel
The decision
What we are asking: approval to move training administration into Learnlog, a data processing agreement, and later a budget line of about €[X] per year for our company size. The price follows the number of employees and is billed annually, excl. VAT; the exact amount is shown in the app before you confirm. Starting free is possible today, with no budget and no purchase order.
When: the works council or union delegation advice is due by 15 March at the latest, the plan by 31 March. Starting in February is not a luxury.
If we do nothing: the same file by hand in March, the social balance sheet from Excel again, and the subsidies and the withholding tax exemption unclaimed again.
What we are not asking for: an IT project or extra headcount. It runs in the browser. The plan is billed annually and we can cancel at any time; the current year is not refunded.
Convinced? Start today.
30 days of the full application, then free. No credit card.
Start free at learnlog.be. Questions: hello@smartlions.email
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