Home Hours criterion: 1,225 hours and half your working time
Hours criterion: 1,225 hours and half your working time
The hours criterion decides whether you get the self-employed allowance and the starter’s allowance. It has two requirements, and many entrepreneurs only know the first.
The two requirements
- You spend at least 1,225 hours per calendar year on your business, about 24 hours a week on average.
- You spend more than half of your total working time on your business. Hours in employment count towards that total.
Exception for starters
If you were not an entrepreneur in one of the previous five years (for 2026: 2021 to 2025), the 50% test does not apply. The 1,225 hours still do.
Which hours count?
Not just billable hours. Administration, acquisition, preparing quotes and travel, including commuting, count. A course counts if it keeps your professional skills for your current business up to date. Study for a new, different activity does not count.
Pregnancy
Weeks around childbirth in which you do not work count as worked, for up to 16 weeks.
Prove it with a time log
If in doubt, you must show the hours were made. Keep a calendar or log with date, activity and hours. Reconstructing afterwards is hard and less convincing.
If you fall short
You lose the self-employed and starter’s allowances, but keep the SME profit exemption. We check with you whether there are hours you have not counted.
Not sure you meet the hours criterion?
Tell us briefly what is going on. Within one working day you hear what we can do for you and what it costs, before we start.
Rather talk it through? Call now