Employer
The modernisation of public collection and the New Collection Act of 2026 result in changes for employers.
Does this apply to you?
This applies to you if you have employer responsibility.
This is changing
As an employer, you may be required to make deductions from an employee’s salary (attachment of earnings) to cover unpaid claims.
Currently, an employee can have several attachments of earnings to their salary, from the Tax Administration, the Norwegian National Collection Agency (SI), the Collection Agency for Child Support and Overpaid Benefits, the police (regular enforcement officer), or from municipalities. From 2026, all these enforcement authorities will gather their claims into one single coordinated attachment of earnings per employee. Even if there are multiple claims against the employee, there’ll only be one deduction from the salary.
For a transition period, an employee may still have more than one attachment of earnings at the same time. All attachments of earnings under the old scheme will be phased out by 2029, but the number of such cases will gradually decrease before then.
As an employer, you may have some employees with deductions under the old scheme and others with coordinated deductions, so you must be able to handle both.
The requirement for a tax deduction account when paying salaries will be phased out from 2026. Employers must pay withholding tax directly to the Tax Administration on the first working day after salary payment, instead of transferring the amount into a dedicated tax deduction account.
January will be a transition month
The new set of rules applies from 1 January 2026, but you must follow the old regulations for salary paid in 2025.
- You must pay the sixth period for 2025 from the tax deduction account by 15 January 2026.
- At the same time, you must start ongoing payments of withholding tax directly to the Tax Administration for salary paid from and including January 2026.
- Remember to change the account number for payment
From January 2026, your accounting system should support ongoing payments of withholding tax.
From 2026, you must report the salary payment date in the a-melding.
There’s no longer any need for a bank guarantee as an alternative scheme to a tax deduction account.
Release funds from a tax deduction account
If the enterprise has money left in their tax deduction account when it’s discontinued, there are two possible ways for you to get this money back:
- If the amount in the tax deduction account is less than NOK 12 000 after payment of the sixth period for 2025, you will get an automatic refund of the money. The amount will be paid after 10 April 2026.
- If the amount in the tax deduction account is NOK 12 000 or more after payment of the sixth period for 2025, you must apply for a refund of the money.
There’s no longer any need for a bank guarantee as an alternative scheme to a tax deduction account.
If you have a previous bank guarantee, the Tax Administration will consider it terminated as of 1 January 2026. Neither you nor your bank need to send a formal notice to terminate the guarantee. The Tax Administration will not submit claims under these guarantees after the first quarter of 2026. You’ll get information about the changes from your bank.
From 1 January 2026, employers must pay withholding tax and attachment of earnings on the first working day after paying salaries. You must pay the deductions directly to the Tax Administration.
The due date for paying employer's national insurance contributions remains unchanged.
When employees work in several countries
In some very specific cases, it can be difficult to know how much of the salary is subject to withholding tax in Norway at the time of payment. Employers may then apply to extend the due date for the advance tax deduction to the fifth day of the following month.
The condition for applying is that there’s a real uncertainty about the duty to deduct withholding tax.
These employers can apply for an extension of the deadline
This could be employers with employees who, as part of their normal work arrangements, have employees working in several countries during the same month. Another condition is that the number of days the employee works in each country has not been determined at the time of salary payment.
As a rule, this scheme is not relevant for employers:
- that make salary payments in arrears
- that can use work plans, shift work, or work rotas to determine withholding tax liability to Norway
- where the uncertainty about the advance tax deduction applies to less than 10 percent of the employees whose withholding tax is reported to Norway. We expect employers in these cases to correct the advance tax deduction instead of us granting a general exemption. We’ll process applications according to the organisation number.
Requirements for the application
Businesses that believe they meet the conditions must submit an application. The applicant must be authorised to represent the company.
The application must include:
- the organisation number of the business
- the contact information of the applicant
- the grounds for the application - such as an estimate of the number of affected employees and their share of the workforce
- employee lists, project contracts, employment contracts, or supporting documents from the payroll system.
The application should also contain:
- the period the application covers (unless otherwise stated, approval is normally granted for one year at a time).
How to submit the application
- Open Write to us
- Tick the box for "Other questions" under "What would you like to write to us about? "
- Write "Application for deferred due date for advance tax deductions" in the description of what the enquiry concerns.
Application via lawyer or adviser
You can submit the application via your lawyer, adviser, or other representatives. Any representative who is not a lawyer, auditor, or accountant, must present a written power of attorney from the business that is applying.
Declarations or confirmations from a lawyer, auditor, or advisor can be included as supporting documents, but are not considered sufficient on their own. You must prove real uncertainty about withholding tax liability in order for the Tax Administration to verify the information in the declaration .
Every business must submit its own application with individual information.
You must report attachment of earnings and advance tax deduction on the salary payment dates in the a-melding.
When will the changes happen
The changes are planned to take effect with the New Collection Act, which enters into force on 1 January 2026.
There will be a gradual transition to the new scheme for attachment of earnings from this date.
Specific about attachment of earnings
The enforcement authorities calculate an attachment of earnings on the basis of subsistence rates and information about the financial situation. In the calculation, they will take into account irregular payments, such as half tax, holiday pay, and similar.
A deduction order is a notification to an employer to start, change, or suspend an attachment of earnings against an employee. From 2026, it will be possible to enter coordinated attachments of earnings directly into the payroll system, if supported by the system provider.
Deduction orders will also be sent as letters to the superior organisation number (legal entity) in Altinn. If the payroll system does not allow for automatic import of deduction orders, these can be entered manually.
Deduction orders for coordinated deductions contain information about the individual the deduction applies to, the start date for the deduction, and the amount or percentage to be deducted. They do not contain an end date or a deduction balance. You must continue the deductions until you receive a new deduction order with a change or suspension.
During a transition period, employers can still have attachment of earnings according to the current scheme. In these cases, deduction orders will still be sent to Altinn or by post. Throughout 2026, attachment of earnings can still be established under the current scheme, but these will gradually be replaced by coordinated deductions.
Attachments of earnings that have been established in the same way as before must continue during the deduction period or until you receive notification to stop the deduction. As long as the employee does not have coordinated deduction, all deductions for must be handled as they are today. This also applies to the start-up of new deductions that are on hold at a future date.
About making deductions from employees’ salaries under to the current scheme
If an employee gets a coordinated deduction, all other deductions must be terminated. If there are future deduction orders on hold, these must not be started. The coordinated deduction will then be the only attachment of earnings for the employee.
The enforcement authorities will continuously send the deduction orders according to the case processing status. The start date can fall on any day of the month. You must make sure the attachment of earnings is registered as close as possible to the payroll run. If you receive a deduction order after the payroll run but before payment, you may consider starting the deduction from the next payroll run.
The attachment of earnings will be specified as a percent of gross salary or as a fixed amount.
Some employees receive salary payments several times per month. If the monthly amount is fixed, you can choose how to distribute the deduction across the salary payments of that month. If the deductions are at a percentage rate, this percentage rate must be deducted from every salary payment.
If there is more than one employer, as a rule, percentage deductions will be made for all the employers. The exception is if one employer represents a very small part of the total salary sum.
If the deduction amount is fixed, the income may sometimes be too low to cover it, for example, during unpaid leave. You must then deduct as much as possible. The Collection Authority will reconcile the payment with the a-melding and can see why the deduction amount is too low. If the employee believes the deduction is generally too high, they can contact the enforcement authorities via the logged-in pages at skatteetaten.no or politiet.no, or in other ways.
If the employee receives no salary one month, such as in an employment relationship with hourly wages, the enforcement authorities will catch this in the a-melding.
In months with holiday pay or half tax, you must follow the deduction order, whether it’s a fixed amount or percentage deduction. You cannot deduct more than what the deduction order states, even if the employee asks for this, but the employee can pay directly to the Collection Authority.
If the employee has paid the creditor’s claim after the salary deduction was processed, the Collection Authority will ensure a refund to the employee. You do not need to do anything.
Coordinated attachments of earnings must be paid to the Collection Authority in the Tax Administration on the day following the salary payment. The account number and KID number are stated in the deduction order. There’ll be one single, new account number for all the coordinated attachment of earnings. The KID number is unique to each employee and must be used on all payments that apply to this person.
The attachment of earnings for tax must also be paid monthly from and including January 2026, as opposed to payment by period such as today. Payment of these deductions will be made into the same account as previously. The exception to this is the payment for the sixth period 2025, which must follow the usual due date for the period.
Other non-coordinated attachments of earnings will continue to be processed as they are today.
You must report attachments of earnings for tax and coordinated attachments of earnings in the a-melding. From January 2026, the a-melding will distinguish between tax-related attachments of earnings under the current scheme and the coordinated attachment of earnings. They must be reported using two different codes in the a-melding. If you have a payroll system, the payroll system must be adapted to this.
The preparations you must make
Contact the supplier of your payroll and personnel system well in advance to ensure that they implement the new date fields for salary payment and advance tax deduction in the a-melding.
Check whether they plan to develop support for importing information on deduction orders directly into the system.
There will be a gradual transition to the new scheme for deductions from salary from 1 January 2026. This means that the systems must support both the old and the new schemes during a transition period from 2026 through 2028.
Before you start using the new solutions for attachments of earnings, you must give power of attorney to your system supplier so they can exchange data on your behalf. You do this in Altinn. Your system supplier can help you with this.
Employers must pay withholding tax on salary directly to the Tax Administration and not via a dedicated tax deduction account. This means that you can close the tax deduction account.
January will be a transition month
The new set of rules applies from 1 January 2026, but you must follow the old regulations for salary paid in 2025.
- You must pay the sixth period for 2025 from the tax deduction account by 15 January 2026.
- At the same time, you must start ongoing payments of withholding tax directly to the Tax Administration for salary paid from and including January 2026.
- Remember to change the account number for payment
From January 2026, your accounting system should support ongoing payments of withholding tax.
From 2026, you must report the salary payment date in the a-melding.
There’s no longer any need for a bank guarantee as an alternative scheme to a tax deduction account.
Release funds from a tax deduction account
If the enterprise has money left in their tax deduction account when it’s discontinued, there are two possible ways for you to get this money back:
- If the amount in the tax deduction account is less than NOK 12 000 after payment of the sixth period for 2025, you will get an automatic refund of the money. The amount will be paid after 10 April 2026.
- If the amount in the tax deduction account is NOK 12 000 or more after payment of the sixth period for 2025, you must apply for a refund of the money.
You must establish a new workflow and new routines for the payment of withholding tax on salary.
Once the proposition enters into force, the latest payment deadline for withholding tax will be the first working day after the salary payment each month .
It’s important to plan for liquidity when you must pay salary and withholding tax at the same time.
As an employer, you must ensure that the employee responsible for salary payments and attachments of earnings is familiar with the changes in the new legislation.
Information for employees with salary deductions
Under the new scheme, you’ll only get the following information to protect the employee’s privacy:
- who’s being deducted (national identity number or D number)
- the amount or percentage rate you must deduct
- when to start making the deductions
You’ll no longer be able to inform the employee about which claims the deduction is based on or who the creditor is.
The employee can find the overview of their claims and deductions by logging in to skatteetaten.no or politiet.no. They’ll also find information in the letters from the Tax Administration and the police (enforcement officer) in Altinn.
Related information
What do the New Collection Act and the digitalisation program The Future of Public Collection entail for you if you’re