Leisure employment

In special cases, your work can be a second job

If your work cannot be categorized as self-employment, wealth management or regular salaried work, it will most likely be leisure work.

The work you spend on leisure activities cannot be used to earn an unemployment benefit right. However, all the hours you spend on leisure employment must be deducted from your unemployment benefits and early retirement benefits.

Unlike self-employment as a second job, there is no limit to how long you can do this work, as is known from the 30-week rule for second jobs and supplementary unemployment benefits. 

As a starting point, it will always be leisure employment in the following situations:

• If you are a part-time farmer, you should contact us as special rules apply to this area
• If you have a rental property with up to 10 leases (where you only have limited work related to the rental)
• If you have five hectares or less of protected forest on your permanent or holiday home, it is typically a leisure occupation
• If you have your own wind turbine, photovoltaic system or similar renewable energy source (where you only have limited work associated with this)
• If you have beekeeping with a maximum of 20 hives.

Most often, there will be situations where the work meets the conditions for both self-employment and leisure employment. Here you have the opportunity to choose how we should consider the work.

As a rule, the choice is binding for the entire period during which you receive unemployment benefits. However, there may be situations where you or SKAT can change this definition.

Read about the rules of self-employment.