Deferred withholding deadline eases proof; payout date now required

Employers with staff who normally work in several countries during a month can apply to defer the due date for advance withholding tax (forskuddstrekk)Skatteetaten where they do not yet know, at payout, how many days each employee worked in each countrySkatteetaten. From 2026 employers pay forskuddstrekk and attachments directly to SkatteetatenSkatteetatenSkatteetaten no later than the first business day after wages are paidLovdata. An employer granted deferral instead pays by the 5th of the month after the payout.Skatteetaten Deferral runs from the decision date through the end of 2027SkatteetatenSkatteetaten, and Skatteetaten assesses each application individually for each organisation number.Skatteetaten Employers must withhold in advance before wages are paidSkatteetaten, and must withhold a higher amount than the tax card shows when the employee requests it in good time, under skattebetalingsloven § 5-5.

The scheme is narrow. It covers only employers whose staff normally work in several countries within a month and who cannot tell the country split when paying wages.Skatteetaten Most employers do not qualify and should not applySkatteetaten: no application is needed where wages are paid in arrears, where rosters, shift plans or rotation schemes settle the Norwegian withholding duty, or where the uncertainty covers fewer than 10 per cent of the employees reported for Norwegian withholdingSkatteetaten — those employers are expected to correct the withholding themselves rather than receive a general exception.Skatteetaten When assessing applications, Skatteetaten looks at the employer's payment history and any unpaid claims.

What the application must contain has now changed. The application is a reasoned account of the uncertaintySkatteetaten: organisation number, contact details for the person responsible, a concrete justification, an estimate of how many employees are affected and what share of the workforce they make up, the payroll payment date and whether staff are paid in advance or arrears, and any documentation supporting the uncertainty.SkatteetatenSkatteetatenSkatteetaten The payroll-date and advance-or-arrears details are new mandatory items.Skatteetaten The previously mandatory enclosures — employee lists, project contracts, employment contracts and documentation from the payroll reporting system — are no longer required as such;Skatteetaten documentation is now optional supporting materialSkatteetaten. The wording shifts from documenting the uncertainty to justifying itSkatteetatenSkatteetaten, and the paragraph stating that statements from a lawyer, auditor or adviser are not enough on their own, with its demand to document genuine uncertainty for verification, has been removed.SkatteetatenSkatteetaten

How to apply is unchanged. The applicant must be able to represent the business concerned. Applications go through "Skriv til oss", selecting "Annet" and entering "Søknad om utsatt forfallsfrist på forskuddstrekk" as the subject. An application may be sent through a lawyer, adviser or other representative; a representative who is not a lawyer, auditor or accountant must enclose a written fullmakt from the applying business, and each business files its own application with its own details.

For the coming payroll runs, an affected employer should state the payout date and the advance-or-arrears pattern up front, attach only documentation that actually supports the uncertainty, and have the responsible contact ready — while employers outside the narrow group should keep the ordinary first-business-day deadline and self-correct small deviations instead of applyingSkatteetaten.

Legal basis: skattebetalingsloven chapter 5 on employers' duty to withhold tax in advance, including § 5-5 on withholding amounts, applied through Skatteetaten's deferred-due-date application for employers with multi-country staff.