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Source: https://nos.nl/artikel/2316387-meer-echtscheidingen-voor-nieuwe-jaar-vlak-voor-wetswijziging.html

(Google translated).

More divorces for new year, just before legislative change

Law firms receive more divorce applications this month than normally this time, they report to the NOS. That has everything to do with the new rules regarding partner maintenance, which will start in the coming year. In many cases, partner alimony goes down considerably from a maximum of 12 to a maximum of 5 years.

Women in particular are currently in a hurry to apply for divorce before January 1:
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More divorces for the new year, just before legislative change

This means that future beneficiaries of alimony will soon try to fall under the old scheme, which guarantees a longer-term payment. "Normally December is a quiet month, because people are lifting a divorce over the Christmas holidays," says mediator and lawyer Saskia Braun. "That period is either a final test case or one chooses to keep it quiet and 'cozy' for children. The peak is therefore usually in the new year and not, as now, before January 1."
Not of this time

This means that those entitled to maintenance, in most cases women, receive less money for maintenance. And, on the other hand, partners with a higher income have to pay less years of alimony. It has now been laid down that the most-earning partner must supplement the other person's income for a maximum of twelve years if he does not have enough money to live on. Although more and more women are economically independent, on average they still earn less than men and work more often in part-time jobs.

The 12-year payout time dates back to 1994. The law is now coming because the government believes that times have changed, and in too many cases ex-spouses, mostly men, have been wrongly required to pay alimony for twelve years while their ex-wife is already able to is supposed to make ends meet financially. Parties also think it is more up-to-date to assume equality between men and women.

Although the maximum number of years is now being reduced to five, there are legal exceptions: long-term marriages and marriages with young children.
The new rules

Partner alimony will be turned around by 2020: instead of a maximum of 12 years, the payment from the most earning ex-partner to the other will be reduced to half the marriage duration with a maximum of five years from the divorce date. The new rules have exceptions:

- People born before or on January 1, 1970 and married for more than fifteen years are entitled to ten years of maintenance.
- For couples with children under the age of 12, the ex-partner retains the right to maintenance for twelve years until the youngest child is twelve.
- After a marriage of at least fifteen years, where the alimony recipient reaches the state pension age within ten years after the divorce, he or she is entitled to alimony for ten years up to the state pension age with a maximum of ten years.

The judge always keeps the last word in distressing cases. That falls under the hardship clause. The possibility to grant a longer term than five years in distressing cases remains.

A survey by the Family and Inheritance Lawyers and Divorce Mediators Association shows that more than half of the divorcing couples are not aware of the consequences of the new law. Lawyer and mediator Hilal Sanli of the eponymous office in Helmond sees that reflected in her office.

She currently receives many urgent requests for a divorce before 31 December because new clients did not know about the change before. "It is enormously booming at the moment because it is a drastic change in the law. Usually it is the female partner who is entitled to alimony and they want to have filed for divorce before 31 December."
Crowds

Michaël Lentze, chairman of the Association of Mediators in the Notarial Profession (VMN), confirms the current divorce pressure. He thinks courts are "going to get really busy", with divorce cases that might not have been a dispute otherwise. "This will sometimes lead to some hardening, because in some cases only mediation was chosen and not a court case."

According to Lentze, the law was also adopted fairly quickly. "Although you see that with every new regulatory term, people often change their mind at the last minute."