Germany extended § 127 SGB IV, the transitional rule protecting freelance teachers from being reclassified as employees, from the end of 2026 to 31 December 2027. It changes nothing for anyone outside teaching. If you teach, train or lecture, your existing consent declaration only covers you to the end of 2026, so you need a fresh signed declaration for 2027, attached to your framework contract with each provider. Non-teaching freelancers get no such protection and should use the free Clearingstelle status determination procedure early, plus 9am's free false self-employment self-check, especially if most of their work comes from one client.
If you teach, train or lecture on a freelance basis in Germany, a single paragraph decides whether your fees from the past few years can be reclassified as social insurance contributions. That paragraph just gained twelve months. And it needs a fresh signature for 2027.
§ 127 SGB IV now runs to 31 December 2027. Anyone treating that as a formality is underestimating two things: the consent declarations expire at the end of this year, and every self-employed person outside teaching never got one in the first place.
What § 127 SGB IV actually does
The starting point is the Herrenberg ruling. On 28 June 2022 the Federal Social Court decided the status of a music school teacher in Herrenberg, case B 12 R 3/20 R. Deutsche Rentenversicherung summarises the reasoning like this: the work was defined by the duty to perform it personally in fixed rooms, and the teacher was integrated into the school's operations. Verdict: dependent employment, despite a contract that said self-employment.
The Bundestag's research service describes the real break soberly. Before Herrenberg, contractual agreements carried evidentiary weight. Since Herrenberg only the lived practice counts, because the protective purpose of social insurance forbids the parties from disposing of it between themselves. For music schools, adult education centres, language schools and training providers, that meant years of back-payment claims, in some cases reaching a long way into the past.
§ 127 SGB IV is the emergency brake. With effect from 1 March 2025: if client and teacher agreed at the point of contract that the work was self-employed, and the teacher consents, no insurance or contribution liability arises from that engagement during the transitional period. Contributions already paid stay lawful and are not refunded.
Two limits matter. The rule covers teaching activity. GKD Rechtsanwälte read the term broadly, as far as driving instruction, but non-pedagogical consulting falls outside it. And the rule does not create self-employment. It freezes the consequences.
The extension arrived as an attachment
§ 127 SGB IV was originally due to expire at the end of 2026. It was extended in the slipstream of a completely different law.
According to Noerr, the Committee for Labour and Social Affairs brought the extension into its 4 March 2026 deliberations on the Bürgergeld reform, and the Bundestag adopted it on 5 March 2026. The Neufang Akademie names the Thirteenth Act amending Book Two of the Social Code as the vehicle and 27 March 2026 as the day the Bundesrat waived the mediation committee. The Bundestag's own record for 5 March 2026 documents the recorded vote on the Grundsicherung reform, 320 to 268 with 2 abstentions, without mentioning § 127 anywhere in the text. So the link between the extension and that law comes from the law firm briefings, not from the parliament's own announcement.
At Freelance Unlocked 2026, Lilian Tschan, State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, confirmed the extension from the stage and explained it:
"To give the education providers, institutions and teachers who are particularly affected by the Herrenberg ruling enough lead time to adjust to the coming new law, we have extended the transitional rule that was created for it to the end of 2027." (Lilian Tschan, translated from German)
And immediately after, the sentence that explains the deadline:
"But we also want a certain transition period before a new law comes into force. That is why our goal is to create a new rule by the end of this year." (Lilian Tschan, translated from German)
So the extension is not a gift to the education sector. It is a date being moved, and it buys the ministry time for the status reform.
Your job this year: a fresh consent declaration for 2027
The practical core sits in one sentence at TWW Law: a new consent is required for the 2027 extension period. Old declarations dated to 31 December 2026 do not cover 2027.
The consent is not tied to a statutory form, but it should exist at least in text form for evidentiary reasons. Collect it verbally and you effectively do not have it. A declaration that holds up usually contains:
- the teacher's name and a reference to the specific framework or fee agreement,
- the statement that both sides assumed self-employed activity when the contract was concluded,
- explicit consent that under § 127 SGB IV no insurance or contribution liability from employment arises for the period up to 31 December 2027,
- a clarification that the declaration covers every individual assignment under that agreement,
- date and signature from both sides.
Three things go wrong in practice. First, the declaration belongs with the framework agreement, otherwise it is missing by the third course in autumn. Second, anyone working for several providers needs one per client. Third, consent protects the transitional period. It does not end a status determination already under way, and it changes nothing about what applies from 2028.
The honest note: education providers collect these declarations because they carry the liability. For you as a teacher, signing is still usually the better option, because it takes back-payments and status disputes for 2027 off the table. It is not a substitute for deciding what your setup should look like in 2028.
Why teachers only
The question has been in the room since the rule was written. Why does a language teacher get legal certainty while an IT freelancer on the same education project gets none?
TWW Law calls the restriction to teaching activity legally disputed and the narrow scope constitutionally questionable, because comparable work in other sectors is simply left out. The explanation is historical rather than legal: there was a ruling about a music school teacher, a sector with thousands of identical cases, and political pressure from that one corner. The legislator put out the fire that was burning.
That is exactly where Jörn Freynick, General Secretary of the BAGSV, aims his criticism in the expert panel at Freelance Unlocked. His proposal for the coming reform is about how the system is built:
"In my view there has to be a definition of a self-employed person as a whole, so that we stop looking only at each individual assignment." (Jörn Freynick, translated from German)
His example was a stuntman with a horse in the paddock and a specialised vehicle in the garage, who needs neither of them on one particular job and can therefore count as falsely self-employed on that job. His conclusion:
"We have to treat somebody as self-employed overall, rather than reducing it to the single assignment." (Jörn Freynick, translated from German)
As long as the law assesses each assignment on its own, every sector needs its own exception. § 127 SGB IV is the first one.
Tschan made the same diagnosis from the other direction on stage: for the vast majority of working people the status is entirely clear and uncontested, while for a comparatively small group the current law does not always produce the result the contracting parties wanted. You can argue about the size of that small group. Not about the direction.
What everyone else can do now
If you do not teach, there is no transitional rule for you. There are three tools most people never use.
The status determination procedure, early. The body in charge is the Clearingstelle at Deutsche Rentenversicherung Bund. The procedure is free, runs on paper, and either side of the engagement can start it. The lever is timing: if the application is filed within one month of taking up the activity, insurance liability starts only when the decision is announced, even if that decision says employment. Ask after three years and you are asking retroactively.
The self-check, before somebody else checks. 9am's free false self-employment self-check walks through the questions an audit asks: instructions, integration, your own equipment, how many clients you have, whether you carry real entrepreneurial risk. It takes a few minutes and it is the only exercise in this article you can finish today. If you work regularly for education providers and also do concept work, consulting or project management alongside the teaching, note that this part of your work is not covered by § 127 SGB IV.
The contract work. How contracts actually perform in an audit, and where they do nothing at all, is in our piece on false self-employment, pension insurance and contracts.
The bridge to 2028
The timetable is suspiciously tidy. § 127 SGB IV ends on 31 December 2027. The draft bill on the new self-employment that has been under discussion since April 2026 is dated to start on 1 January 2028, partly because of the software adjustments the social insurance institutions need. On paper, one hands over to the other.
On paper. The draft has been leaked, not passed, and Tschan's goal of a new rule this year is a goal. If the law slips, the protection for teachers still ends on 31 December 2027. What is meant to go into that draft, and where the associations are pushing back, is in our analysis of the false self-employment reform. If you teach across borders, our DACH comparison explains why a German consent declaration is worth nothing in Vienna or Zurich.
What to do on Monday
- Check the date on your consent declaration. If it says 31 December 2026, you need a new one for 2027. Ask the provider now rather than waiting until they are buried in December.
- List your clients. One declaration per provider, attached to the framework agreement rather than to the individual course.
- Separate teaching from non-teaching. Concept work, consulting and project management fall outside § 127 SGB IV. If you do both for the same client, they belong in separate contracts and separate invoices.
- Run the status check. The false self-employment self-check shows you within minutes which parts of your setup would stand out. For a new engagement, add the one-month window for the status determination procedure.
- Build 2028 in now. Several clients, your own equipment, visible marketing, real economic risk. Those are the features the draft hangs on, and they need two years of lead time, not two weeks.
The most effective protection against the status question is still the second, third and fourth client. If your calendar currently rests on one education provider, create a free profile on 9am and let companies across DACH match against your subjects, so the spread exists before anybody asks about it.
This article is general information and does not constitute legal advice.
Freelance Unlocked is co-organized by 9am together with Uplink and freelancermap. This article draws on the session of Lilian Tschan and the expert panel on the false self-employment reform at Freelance Unlocked 2026. Watch the full talks above, and join us at the next edition: freelanceunlocked.com.
