AISBL Guide - Mandatory Yearly Tasks

This document contains things to know to create and manage an AISBL (International non-profit association seated in Belgium). We fill information here as we learn it, so don’t expect to find here complete, definitive information.

Mandatory yearly tasks and reports

General calendar

	J	F	M	A	M	J	J	A	S	O	N	D
Association tax declaration			x
General assembly				x
Approval of last year’s report				x
Updating of UBO register				x
Filing of last year’s report					x
Approval of next year’s budget						x
Tax declaration									x
VAT declarations, if applicable			x			x			x			x
VAT list of clients, if applicable												x

Determining the type of the AISBL

The size of the AISBL determines its accounting obligations:

• The nano association does not exceed more than one of the following criteria:
  • 5 full-time equivalent (FTE) workers on average over the year
  • € 334,500 in revenue excluding VAT (excluding exceptional revenue)
  • € 1,337,500 in total Assets
  • € 1,337,500 in total Debts
• The micro association does not exceed more than one of the following criteria:
  • 10 FTE workers on average over the year
  • € 7,000,000 in turnover excluding VAT (excluding exceptional receipts)
  • € 3,500,000 balance sheet total 3.
• The small association does not exceed more than 1 of the following criteria:
  • 50 FTE workers on average over the year
  • € 9,000,000 in turnover excluding VAT (excluding exceptional receipts)
  • € 4,500,000 balance sheet total
• The large association exceeds more than 1 of the following criteria:
  • 50 FTE workers on average over the year
  • € 9,000,000 in turnover excluding VAT (excluding exceptional receipts)
  • € 4,500,000 balance sheet total

General assembly

The association must hold, at least once a year, a general assembly meeting, where, at minimum, the approval of last year’s financial report and next year’s expenditure budget must be voted. The way the meeting is organised is determined by the statutes or other internal ruling. There is no mandatory date to perform the meeting, but it must happen once a year and is usually done before April.

Yearly financial report

Each year, a financial report must be established, giving:

• The detail of all money earned and spent by the association over the past year
• All assets (money and goods) owned by the association
• All debts the association has

The form this report must be made and filed depends on the size of the association determined above:

• nano associations can opt for a simplified report which needs to be filed each year to the Entreprise Court’s greffe.
• micro and small associations must use double-entry accounting and submit their report to the national bank of Belgium.
• large associations must also use double-entry accounting, use an extended report system and submit it to the national bank of Belgium.

This must be done maximum one month after the annual general assembly meeting.

Budget

All non-profit organisations are required to draw up a budget each year for the following financial year and have it approved by the General Assembly, no later than 6 months after the end of the year. The form of your budget can be chosen freely, as it is not determined by legal provisions. It is nevertheless advisable to draw up the budget on the basis of the same diagram as the annual accounts.

The budget remains internal. Unlike annual accounts, it is not registered with a third party.

Tax declaration

Associations must submit each year a tax declaration.

The association can be subject to the legal persons tax regime, or societies tax regime. Basically, it is submitted to the legal persons tax if it does not perform any commercial operation, ans to the societies tax if it engages in commercial operations (ie, it sells goods).

With the legal persons tax regime, an ASBL is in principle not taxed on the profits made (for example, the receipts from a spaghetti evening that you organize occasionally to finance the objectives of your ASBL). You therefore do not have to include these profits in the declaration. However, certain other income must be declared:

• real estate income located in Belgium (except income from private rentals, market garden and agricultural rents, rentals to non-profit tenants) or located abroad (unless a double taxation agreement provides for taxation in the country in which the property is located)
• income from movable and capital property (both received and allocated) (a non-profit organization must also pay withholding tax for certain income and therefore complete a declaration for withholding tax 273 or 273A)
• certain capital gains on land located in Belgium or on certain rights in rem on this land
• certain capital gains on buildings located in Belgium or on certain rights in rem on these buildings
• capital gains on major holdings (sale, exchange, contribution, etc.)
• financial benefits or advantages of any kind (in the context of corruption)
• pensions, lump sums, employer contributions and bonuses
• unjustified costs or benefits of any kind, and corruption
• car expenses up to a portion of the benefit in kin
• the costs of the mobility allowance up to a proportion of the benefit in kind

You must be able to justify all the income and expenditure of your non-profit organization with supporting documents. Unjustified expenses may possibly be penalized by a maximum tax at the rate of 102%.

The declaration must be submitted by October 28.

VAT

An AISBL may be subject to VAT if it carries out a regular and independent economic activity (with or without profit) for which goods are supplied or services are performed. This activity can be main or secondary. When an AISBL does not deliver goods or services for consideration but only receives donations, it is not subject to VAT and does not need to have a VAT identification number.

The association can still, however, perform occasional commercial activities and is not liable for VAT for such (ex. selling pancakes) provided that:

• the ASBL is exempt from VAT (above)

• the activities are organized with the aim of providing financial support to the non-profit organization

• the activity is organized by the ASBL and that any contribution is for the benefit of the ASBL only

Warning: Activities of this kind cannot occur frequently, otherwise they will be considered a main activity.

When starting commercial activities, essentially the selling of goods or services, the AISBL must register to the VAT. To complete the registration, the following information is needed:

• The yearly income

• The NACE categorie(s) to which the AISBL belongs to

• Which parts of the yearly income fall under Article 44

After registering to the VAT, the AISBL must:

• File quarterly reports, stating the total amount of operations (in and out) subject to VAT

• File yearly list of VAT clients the AISBL has sold goods or services to

• Retain a VAT of 21% over all sold goods or services, and pay that amount quarterly to the finance administration

UBO register

The UBO register is an anti-corruption and anti-money-laundry system in Belgium, that keeps track of possible beneficiaries of companies and associations. For non-profit organizations and foundations, the following are considered effective beneficiaries:

• Administrators
• The people who are authorised to represent the association
• The people in charge of the daily management of the non-profit organization or the foundation
• The founders of a foundation
• The natural persons or, when these persons have not yet been designated, the category of natural persons in whose main interest the non-profit organization or the foundation was formed or operates. This is mainly when the association is specifically aimed at funding a certain person or designated group of people
• Any other natural person exercising by other means the ultimate control over the non-profit organisation or foundation

The UBO register must be kept updated each year with the effective beneficiaries of the association. It can be accessed with the Belgian ID card of one of the administrators registered as such at the CBE. There is no limit date specified, but any change of beneficiaries must be registered within one month to the UBO register.

Associations tax

ASBLs/AISBLs with more than € 25,000 in assets are subject to an annual tax of 0.17% of their declared assets value. If the ASBL’s assets are less than or equal to € 25,000, it is not subject to the tax. It is, however, still required to fill a declaration and indicate that the assets do not exceed € 25,000.

The declaration must be filed no later than March 31. Each ASBL receives, in principle, an invitation from the Legal Security office to submit a declaration during the month of February.

Social report

Non-profit organisations that employ an average of 20 or more staff per year, including small non-profit organisations, must draw up a social balance sheet.

Employment and contracting

AISBLs can contract workers, either as independent workers or employee workers.

Warning, a member of the AISBL being contracted as a worker (independent or employee) can often be seen as a conflict of interests. Such situations need to be extremely well and clearly formulated and written.

Employee workers

Contracting employees requires a large amount of administrative procedures (FR), mainly register to different social security levels and contract an insurance against work damages. An employee contract can be full or part time, and with no time limit or with a certain time frame, for a certian kind of tasks or not. Part of employment boost measures, Belgium offers several kinds of helps to employers.

Independent workers

An AISBL can contract an independent worker without any regulation or inscription. However, in this case, all the burden of taxes, social securities and everything else is the responsability of the worker. It is therefore important that the worker shows their compliance to this. It is usually done by issuing an invoice where details over the worker’s social security or tax inscription are given, which could allow the AISBL to check that the worker is indeed in order with their tax administration.