Abridged or full annual accounts: which schema for your SRL

Key takeaways

• The applicable schema depends on the SRL's category (micro, small or large), set by the thresholds of art. 1:24 and 1:25 CAC.
• The full schema (art. 3:1 CAC) requires more detailed notes than the abridged schema (art. 3:2 CAC), in particular on auditor fees and related-party transactions.
• Only small companies can choose the abridged schema or the micro-schema; a listed company stays on the full schema whatever its size.
• A change of category only takes effect after two consecutive financial years above or below the thresholds.
• Filing the wrong schema with the NBB triggers a mandatory corrective filing (art. 3:14 CAC), with a surcharge if the legal seven-month deadline is exceeded.

Choosing between abridged and full annual accounts is not a box ticked at random on the filing portal: it is the Companies and Associations Code (CAC) that determines your SRL's category, and therefore the notes you must produce. Since the size thresholds were raised on 1 January 2024, SRLs previously considered large have moved back down to small company, opening the door to the abridged schema, sometimes without the manager or the accountant realising it at closing. This article details what genuinely separates the two schemas, how the category is set and changed, and what happens if the wrong schema lands at the National Bank of Belgium.

The most common reflex, for a small SRL that has always filed the same type of accounts, is to carry over last year's schema without rechecking the criteria. This works as long as the company's situation stays stable, and becomes risky as soon as a given year departs from the usual trajectory: rapid growth, a partial sale of activity, leaving or joining a group. The schema is never a given from one year to the next, it has to be recalculated.

Micro, small or large company: the criterion that sets the schema

The annual accounts schema is not a matter of convenience: it flows directly from the category the SRL falls into at the close of the financial year. The CAC distinguishes three categories in art. 1:24 and 1:25, and the royal decree of 29 April 2019 implementing the CAC sets out, in its Book 3, the schema that corresponds to each.

	Micro-schema	Abridged schema	Full schema
Company category	Micro-company (art. 1:25 CAC)	Small company (art. 1:24 CAC)	Large company, or listed whatever its size
Legal basis of the schema	Art. 3:3 CAC	Art. 3:2 CAC	Art. 3:1 CAC
Workers (annual average)	≤ 10 FTE	≤ 50 FTE	> 50 FTE (2 criteria exceeded)
Net turnover excl. VAT	≤ 900,000 €	≤ 11,250,000 €	> 11,250,000 €
Balance-sheet total	≤ 450,000 €	≤ 6,000,000 €	> 6,000,000 €

A listed company, or one that exceeds the large-company thresholds, has no choice: it remains subject to the full schema (art. 3:1 CAC), even in years when its figures would, in theory, be compatible with a lighter category. Micro-companies and small companies, on the other hand, have the option of a lightened schema: nothing stops a small SRL from filing under the full schema if its internal governance calls for it, but none does so by choice given that the abridged schema already meets its legal obligations.

The vast majority of SRLs created in Belgium fall into the small-company category from their very first financial year: a still-modest turnover and balance-sheet total at start-up are easily enough to stay below both thresholds, even with a small workforce. The micro-schema, lighter still, mainly concerns structures with no employee or one or two full-time equivalents that are not part of a group of companies: belonging to a group automatically rules out micro-company status, whatever the entity's actual size.

Abridged or full schema: what the law requires in addition

The difference between the two schemas is not just the length of the form. The full schema requires information that the abridged schema does not, because it concerns issues specific to larger companies: external control, relationships with related parties, transparency towards a wider range of third parties.

In practice, for a small family SRL with no auditor, these two obligations simply never arise: they are a consequence of the full schema, not an extra box to fill in. It is one of the reasons a single-shareholder SRL or any small structure should check every year that it still falls within its category rather than drifting into heavier obligations by inattention.

The abridged schema nonetheless remains a full schema in its underlying logic: a balance sheet, a profit-and-loss account and notes stay mandatory for every SRL, whatever its size. What changes is the density of the information required in the notes, not its existence. A small, abridged SRL must still detail its fixed assets, its liabilities due after more than one year and its provisions, simply with fewer sub-headings and breakdowns than the full schema requires.

Changing category: the two-consecutive-year rule

An SRL's figures vary from one year to the next, and the legislator anticipated this: a change of category, and therefore of schema, normally takes effect only after two consecutive financial years during which the company exceeds, or falls back below, the legal thresholds.

1. 1

   First year above (or below) the threshold

   Year N

   The threshold being exceeded is noted but does not change the applicable schema for that year.

2. 2

   Second consecutive year in the same situation

   Year N+1

   If the threshold is exceeded for a second year in a row, the change of category takes effect.

3. 3

   New schema applicable

   Year N+1 filing

   The SRL files its year N+1 accounts under the new schema (abridged to full, or the reverse).

Concretely, a small SRL whose turnover briefly exceeds 11,250,000 euros in a single year, before falling back the following year, keeps filing under the abridged schema: a single year above the threshold is never enough to shift the category.

A wrong schema is not a neutral mistake at the NBB filing stage

The filing portal of the National Bank of Belgium's Central Balance Sheet Office expects a structured file (XBRL) matching the declared category's model. Filing the abridged schema for a company that actually falls under the full schema, or the reverse, is not a simple formality with no follow-up: the filing is accepted subject to the NBB's arithmetic and logical checks (art. 3:14 CAC). If these checks reveal substantial errors, such as a schema incompatible with the company's category, the NBB notifies the company, which must then file a corrective version within two months.

This check matters even more during a transition year (a change of management, rapid growth, leaving a group) where the accounting team may default to reusing last year's schema without rechecking the three size criteria. A conversation with the accountant or external chartered accountant, ahead of closing rather than at filing time, settles the question before the XBRL file is generated in the wrong format.

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A decision checklist for choosing the right schema

These checks are enough, ahead of each closing, to secure the choice of schema rather than carrying it over out of habit from one year to the next.

Before filing the annual accounts

• Calculate the average full-time-equivalent workforce for the financial year

  Compare against the 10 FTE (micro) and 50 FTE (small company) thresholds.

• Calculate net turnover excluding VAT

  Compare against the 900,000 € (micro) and 11,250,000 € (small company) thresholds.

• Calculate the balance-sheet total

  Compare against the 450,000 € (micro) and 6,000,000 € (small company) thresholds.

• Check whether more than one of the three criteria is exceeded

  A single criterion exceeded does not change the category; two or three criteria exceeded does.

• Check whether exceeding, or falling back below, the thresholds holds for two consecutive years

  A change of category only takes effect after two consecutive years in the same situation.

• Check that the company is not listed

  A listed company stays on the full schema whatever its size.

Going further

• Accounting obligations of an SRL: complete guide 2026, for keeping the legal books and the NBB filing calendar
• Annual accounts filing penalties in Belgium, for the consequences of not filing over several financial years
• Statutory auditor in a Belgian SRL, for the criteria that require appointing an auditor
• National Bank of Belgium: Central Balance Sheet Office, official source for the terms of filing annual accounts