Recovering unpaid invoices in the Netherlands follows a fixed route: the debtor must be in default, the creditor may then claim statutory interest and a capped amount of extrajudicial collection costs, and if payment still does not follow the claim goes to the kantonrechter or the district court. Most of what determines the outcome happens before that, in the contract and in the first two reminders. This article sets out the legal steps in order, what you may and may not charge, which rules constrain how you approach a debtor, and where the practical leverage actually sits.
The terms that decide your position before anything goes wrong
A collection file is won or lost when the contract is made. The payment term is the first thing to fix in writing, because article 6:119a of the Civil Code sets a default of thirty days from the day after the invoice is received where no term has been agreed. Parties may agree a longer term of up to sixty days; anything beyond that requires an express provision in the contract and must not be manifestly unfair to the creditor. There is a further limit: a large enterprise contracting with a small or medium-sized supplier cannot validly agree a payment term of more than thirty days. A clause that exceeds these limits is void, and the statutory term applies instead, together with interest running from the moment it expires.
The second point is your general terms and conditions. They only bind the other party if they were declared applicable and made available before or at the moment of contracting; handing them over for the first time on the invoice is too late. Terms that survive that test can do real work in a collection file, and our note on general terms and conditions explains how to make them stick: they can fix a payment term, exclude set-off, provide for a contractual penalty and, crucially for suppliers of goods, reserve title until payment. A retention-of-title clause turns an unsecured creditor into someone who can reclaim his goods, including in the debtor bankruptcy, which is worth more than any letter you will ever send.
The third is documentation. Before a court will award anything you must be able to show the agreement, the delivery or performance, the invoice and its receipt. Getting that paperwork right is a job for a պայմանագրային իրավաբան at the start of the relationship, not for a collection file at the end of it. Disputes about unpaid invoices are very often disputes about whether the work was properly delivered, and a file that contains signed delivery notes, approved timesheets or a written acceptance is settled far more quickly than one that does not. Our Նիդեռլանդներում պարտքերի գանձման ուղեցույց sets out the documentation that a Dutch court expects to see.
Default, interest and the costs you may actually charge
Interest and collection costs only become payable once the debtor is in default (verzuim). Where the parties agreed a fixed payment date, default arrives automatically when that date passes; where they did not, the creditor must first send a notice of default (ingebrekestelling) setting a reasonable final period for payment. This is the step most often skipped, and skipping it means that the interest and the costs claimed later have no basis.
Two interest regimes exist side by side. Commercial transactions between businesses carry the statutory commercial interest of article 6:119a of the Civil Code, which is materially higher than the ordinary statutory interest of article 6:119 that applies in all other cases, including claims against consumers. Both percentages are fixed by order in council and are adjusted from time to time, so an invoice or a set of terms that names a rate rather than referring to the statutory rate will be out of date sooner than you think. Contractual interest is permitted and can exceed the statutory rate, but in consumer contracts an excessive rate risks being struck out as an unfair term.
Extrajudicial collection costs are governed by article 6:96 of the Civil Code and the Besluit vergoeding voor buitengerechtelijke incassokosten. The Besluit sets a sliding scale calculated on the principal sum, with a statutory minimum and maximum, and against a consumer that scale is mandatory: you cannot charge more, whatever your general terms say. Against a consumer there is also a strict procedural requirement. The creditor must first send the so-called fourteen-day letter, giving the consumer at least fourteen days counted from the day after receipt to pay without any costs being added, and stating exactly what the collection costs will be if he does not. A letter that miscounts the period or omits the amount does not entitle you to the costs at all, and courts check this of their own motion.
The rules that constrain how you collect
Since 1 April 2024 the Wet kwaliteit incassodienstverlening (Wki) applies to anyone who, in the course of business, collects consumer claims out of court on behalf of a third party or after acquiring them. Such providers must be entered in a public register kept by Justis, must meet requirements on professional competence, treatment of creditors and debtors, information and complaint handling, and are supervised by the Inspectie Justitie en Veiligheid, which can act against providers that fall short. Existing agencies were given a year from 1 April 2024 to register. Advocaten and gerechtsdeurwaarders operate under their own statutory supervisory regimes. For a creditor the practical consequence is simple: check the register before you instruct an agency, because using an unregistered provider puts your own file at risk, and an experienced collection lawyer is not caught by that requirement in the first place.
Alongside the Wki, the ordinary rules on unfair commercial practices apply to consumer collection, and the Autoriteit Consument en Markt enforces them. Communications must state the origin and composition of the claim, may not misstate what will happen next, and may not threaten measures the creditor cannot lawfully take. Announcing a bailiff seizure when no judgment exists is the clearest example, and it is the kind of statement that turns a straightforward file into a complaint. The GDPR applies throughout: debtor data may be processed for the recovery of the claim, but not shared more widely than necessary, and internal blacklists or registrations require their own legal basis.
Choosing the right procedure
Money claims are heard by the kantonrechter up to the threshold in article 93 of the Code of Civil Procedure, at present twenty-five thousand euro, and by the district court above it. The difference matters for cost as well as speed: before the kantonrechter a party may act without a lawyer and the fixed court fee is lower, while proceedings before the district court require representation by an advocaat, which is where our դատավարական թիմ takes over. Where the debtor does not appear, judgment in default follows relatively quickly, and an undefended claim supported by a proper file is usually a matter of months rather than years.
Summary proceedings (kort geding) are frequently presented as the fast route for unpaid invoices, and that is misleading. A money claim in kort geding is only entertained if there is a genuine urgent interest, if the existence of the claim is sufficiently plain, and if the court is satisfied that there is no unacceptable risk that the money cannot be repaid should the claim fail in the main proceedings. For an ordinary overdue invoice those conditions are usually not met. Kort geding is the right instrument where the debtor is disposing of assets, where a contractual performance must be secured, or where the claim is undisputed and the debtor is simply stalling.
Before starting anything, weigh recoverability. A judgment against a debtor without assets costs more than it returns. A check of the Trade Register, the annual accounts filed there and any registered attachments tells you more about the value of a procedure than the size of the invoice does.
Attachment, bankruptcy petitions and other pressure
Prejudgment attachment (conservatoir beslag) is the most effective instrument Dutch law offers a creditor, and it is often underused by foreign parties who assume that nothing can happen before judgment. On a written request the interim relief judge can grant leave under article 700 of the Code of Civil Procedure, usually without hearing the debtor, allowing attachment of bank accounts, receivables, goods or immovable property. The applicant must then start proceedings on the merits within the period the judge sets, and is liable for damage if the attachment turns out to have been unjustified. Used properly it freezes the position and very often produces payment within days.
A bankruptcy petition is a different instrument and should not be treated as a collection tool. It requires that the debtor has stopped paying and that there is more than one creditor; a court that suspects the petition is being used purely as pressure for a disputed single claim will refuse it, and misuse can expose the petitioner to liability. Where the debtor is a consumer who has been admitted to the statutory debt rescheduling scheme (Wsnp), which since 1 July 2023 runs for eighteen months, individual enforcement stops and the claim is dealt with in that scheme.
Դատավճռի կատարումը
A judgment is not payment. Enforcement is carried out by a gerechtsdeurwaarder (bailiff), who can attach a bank balance, wages, benefits, movable property or immovable property on the basis of the judgment. Wage and benefit attachment is limited by the beslagvrije voet, the protected part of income the debtor must retain, which is calculated according to a statutory formula. Certain goods are exempt from attachment altogether. There is no imprisonment for debt in the Netherlands, and a debtor cannot be stopped at the border simply because he owes money, although separate criminal or fiscal grounds can exist; we address that misunderstanding in our article on whether you can be stopped at the airport over a debt.
Enforcement costs are added to the claim, but they too are only recoverable if the steps taken were proportionate. Instructing a bailiff to attach a bank account that is known to be empty produces cost without recovery, which is why the enforcement strategy should follow an assets check rather than precede it.
Debtors in another country
Within the European Union a Dutch judgment is enforceable in the other member states without an intermediate declaration of enforceability, under the Brussels I bis Regulation. Which court has jurisdiction in the first place depends on the same Regulation and on any choice of forum in the contract, and for consumer contracts the consumer can generally only be sued in his own member state. Two European procedures are designed for exactly this situation: the European order for payment, for uncontested claims, and the European small claims procedure for lower-value cross-border claims, both of which can be started on standard forms. There is also a European account preservation order, which allows a bank account in another member state to be frozen.
Outside the European Union, recognition depends on a treaty or on the general Dutch rules on foreign judgments, and starting proceedings in the debtor own jurisdiction is frequently faster. The choice of law and forum clause in the original contract is therefore not boilerplate; it decides how expensive the recovery will be. Our international debt collection practice assesses jurisdiction, applicable law and enforceability before proceedings are begun rather than after a judgment turns out to be unusable.
How long you have: prescription and interruption
A claim to performance of a contractual obligation prescribes five years after the day following the one on which it became due, under article 3:307 of the Civil Code. A shorter period applies to the seller claim for the purchase price in a consumer sale, which prescribes after two years under article 7:28. Once the period has run, the debtor can simply refuse to pay and the court will not help you.
Prescription can be interrupted, and doing so is cheap. A written notice under article 3:317 of the Civil Code in which the creditor unambiguously reserves his right to performance starts a new period, as does the commencement of proceedings or an acknowledgement of the debt by the debtor. What it requires is that the reservation is clear and that you can prove the notice was sent and received. A file of undated reminders does not interrupt anything.
What actually improves your recovery rate
The measures that make the largest difference are unglamorous. Invoice promptly and on the agreed terms; a late invoice invites a late payment. Set a fixed internal escalation timetable and follow it, so that the second reminder, the notice of default and the handover to a lawyer happen on known dates instead of when someone remembers. Send the notice of default correctly, because it is the step that unlocks interest and costs. Screen new customers before you extend credit, and use retention of title, a down payment or security where the exposure justifies it.
Keep the commercial relationship separate from the legal file. A payment arrangement in writing, with the consequences of non-compliance stated, recovers more money than a sequence of increasingly irritated emails, and it preserves a customer you may want to keep. Where a debtor genuinely cannot pay, a settlement recorded properly is worth more than a judgment that cannot be enforced, as we explain in our Dutch debt collection guide. And escalate early: the recovery rate on a claim handed over after three months is markedly better than on one handed over after a year, because assets and goodwill both erode with time.
Ինչպես Law and More կարող է օգնել
We act for creditors and for debtors in Dutch and cross-border collection files, from the notice of default and prejudgment attachment through to proceedings and enforcement, and we advise on the contract terms that prevent the problem in the first place. We tell you at the outset whether a claim is worth pursuing and what it will realistically cost. If you have invoices outstanding or a disputed claim on your desk, contact Law and More for an assessment of your position and the fastest route to payment.
