Child benefit - Your child is going to live outside the Netherlands

If your child starts living in another country, for example, to go to school there, you can continue to get child benefit if the Netherlands has an agreement with that country on the verification of entitlement to benefits, including child benefit.

This applies to all Member States of the European Union (EU), and several other countries, including Turkey and Morocco.

Child benefit at twice the basic rate

In some cases, you can get child benefit at twice the basic rate for a child who does not live at home with you. The amount you get depends on how much you contribute to the child's support. In addition, we will take your child's earnings into account. 

If you or the other parent regularly stays with your child, this could affect your child benefit. To get child benefit at twice the basic rate, you may not spend more than 45 days per quarter with your child. If one or both of a child's parents spend more than 45 days per quarter with a child, we will consider the child to be living at home, and child benefit will be payable at the basic rate.

If you or the other parent pays a number of short visits to your child during a quarter (for example, of 2 or 3 weeks), we will add the visiting periods together. We will also do so if you and the child's other parent visit the child in turn.

If you visit your child in a particular quarter, and your visit continues into the next quarter, your visit may not last more than 45 days either.

Example: you start visiting your child on 21 June and your visit ends on 9 August. That makes a total of 50 days:10 days in the 2nd quarter and 40 days in the 3rd quarter. You will get child benefit at the basic rate for the 3rd quarter.

If your child lives with his or her other parent

If your child lives outside the Netherlands with his or her other parent, and that parent qualifies for Dutch child benefit, we will pay child benefit to the parent with whom the child lives.

In some cases, the other parent will also qualify for child benefit from outside the Netherlands. It will then be decided on the basis of a social security agreement between the countries concerned which country's child benefit has priority. If the amount of the Dutch child benefit is higher, the SVB will supplement the non-Dutch child benefit up to the rate applicable in the Netherlands.