The WBSO is awarded for a number of hours that you or your employees spend developing technically new products, production processes, or software. The subsidy is awarded based on an estimate of the hours; afterwards, you must be able to demonstrate how many hours were actually spent.
It is mandatory for the people working on the WBSO projects (the R&D employees) to keep track of how much time they have spent on each WBSO project. They must do this every day. The recorded hours must be processed in a central timekeeping system within ten working days. Ensure that every employee records their hours every day and process this in your central administration within ten days.
The WBSO is awarded for solving (programming) technical challenges in the development of products, production processes, or software. Only hours spent on solving the challenges are eligible. "Directly and exclusively focused on the research and development activities," the law states.
This is therefore different from what you might think: not all hours for a specific project count, but only those hours actually spent on solving the technical problems. Hours for travel, attending trade fairs and conferences, project hours for administrative or organizational work, secretarial hours, and hours for technical installation work, for example, do not count. In fact, meetings do not count, unless it can be substantiated that the meeting was purely substantive regarding the solutions to the technical bottlenecks.
We advise rounding up worked hours to the nearest quarter hour, unless you already do so differently in your existing time sheet.
If you can explain and justify it, it is not a problem if more than 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week are spent writing. RVO.nl understands perfectly well that a developer might not be keeping a close eye on the clock during a tense moment...
Hours on days off or sick days should also be possible, but even then you must be able to explain and justify them. Normally, hours on sick days or leave days are precisely a trigger for an auditor to mark them as incorrect.
When estimating hours, you can state that someone with a specific position counts for a certain percentage, but the actual hours must be included in the accountability report. Furthermore, entering 6 hours every day is recognized as "no actual hours entered retrospectively" and is therefore counted as incorrect.
Because only hours spent resolving technical bottlenecks count, a number of positions are immediately ruled out. A secretary or a sales representative usually lacks the technical knowledge and depth to contribute substantively to the solutions. Regarding software, it appears that RVO.nl essentially maintains the position that if an employee cannot program, they also lack the technical knowledge to contribute.
Only employees with a 'genuine employment contract' count. The employee must be on the payroll of the applicant company and payroll taxes must be remitted on their behalf. Interns receiving an internship allowance or graduating students do not count. Neither does a hired professional. Managers with a management fee cannot claim their hours either.
There is no fixed format for recording hours. In principle, the back of a beer coaster is permitted, but it must be clear that the employee has recorded the hours actually spent, and the data must be entered into the central administration.
If you are already using time tracking, you can also use it for the WBSO. However, you may need to put in some effort to specifically register and report the WBSO hours.
RVO.nl has a template for tracking hours (see an example below). You can choose to use this. We have also created a (new) time registration template. Ask your Vectrix advisor for it!