Self-employed workers caring for children with cancer or other serious illness will not have their bases regularised from 2027

Social Security will introduce a relevant change in the real-income contribution system for self-employed workers from 1 January 2027: the contribution bases for periods in which the benefit for caring for minors affected by cancer or other serious illness is received will be excluded from the annual regularisation. Those bases will become definitive and will not have to be adjusted later against the worker's net income, El Periodico reports.

The change is contained in Royal Decree-Law 31/2026, of 20 October, published in the BOE of 21 October (BOE-A-2026-21872), which amends article 309 of the consolidated text of the General Social Security Law, the provision listing the contributions excluded from the self-employed regularisation process.

How the annual regularisation works

Since the real-income contribution system was introduced, the self-employed worker chooses a provisional contribution base based on their expected net income. Once the year closes, the Tax Agency informs the General Treasury of Social Security of the final income and the body checks whether the quotas paid match the income obtained. If the worker overpaid, Social Security refunds the difference; if they paid less than due, they must pay the shortfall. That adjustment is the annual quota regularisation.

The legislation, however, contemplates a series of protected periods in which the bases applied become definitive and fall outside that adjustment, provided the self-employed worker must remain registered in the RETA while receiving them. The list includes periods of temporary incapacity, risk during pregnancy, risk during natural breastfeeding, birth and care of a minor, shared responsibility in caring for an infant, and the cessation-of-activity and activity-sustainability benefits in their cyclical or sectoral forms.

The logic of article 309 is to protect protection itself: recognising that during those situations the self-employed worker's capacity to generate income is conditioned by the protected contingency, so requiring a later adjustment of the bases contributed would turn regularisation into an instrument blind to the reality of the period. Adding the care of seriously ill minors completes that catalogue with a benefit whose absence from the list was hard to justify.

What the change adds

The novelty is the express inclusion in that list of the periods of receipt of the benefit for caring for minors affected by cancer or other serious illness. This is not a general quota cut or the disappearance of regularisation for the self-employed as a whole: what the rule establishes is that the bases for those protected periods cannot be revised through the annual real-income adjustment. The change will enter into force on 1 January 2027, under the fourth final provision of the royal decree-law.

The distinction matters to avoid mistaken readings of the news: the self-employed worker receiving this benefit will keep contributing during the protected period, with the particularity that those bases consolidate definitively and will not later be checked against the year's actual income. The remaining months of the year, without receipt of the benefit, will remain subject to the ordinary regularisation procedure like any other period.

The logic of the measure is consistent with that of the other cases in article 309: during social protection situations, the self-employed worker's activity and income are inevitably altered, so subjecting those bases to regularisation would produce adjustments unrelated to the real economic capacity of the period.

How the protection is structured

The benefit for caring for minors affected by cancer or other serious illness is one of the most intense in the Social Security catalogue, designed to allow parents to reduce or interrupt their activity during the child's treatment. For the self-employed, the benefit coexists with the obligation to remain registered in the RETA, which until now posed a practical paradox: the quotas paid during that period remained subject to the annual real-income adjustment, so a family in the midst of a protection situation could receive, months later, a regularisation demand.

With the reform, that scenario disappears from 2027: the bases of those periods will be definitive from the moment they are applied, with the same treatment already given to temporary incapacity or birth and care of a minor. The specific financial effect for each family will depend on the relationship between their actual income for the year and the bases chosen, but the certainty effect is immediate: what is contributed during the benefit is not reviewed.

Reading for advice work

For gestorias and firms, the change requires updating the quota planning roadmaps of self-employed clients with benefits of this kind. Three practical questions are worth distinguishing. First, the time marking: the exclusion operates by periods of receipt of the benefit, so the documentation accrediting those periods must be kept with special care for the 2027 regularisation. Second, continued registration: the exclusion is conditional on the self-employed worker having to remain registered in the RETA during the benefit, a requirement worth verifying in each case. Third, the calendar: the measure has no retroactive effects and will apply for the first time to 2027 bases, whose regularisation will occur in 2028.

The same royal decree-law has introduced another operational novelty already in force: the new regulatory base for self-employed temporary incapacity, which we analyse in this piece on article 318.h) of the LGSS. Both reforms share the same logic of adapting the group's social protection to the particularities of its contribution system.

It is also worth preparing communication with affected clients in advance: the measure is announced with more than a year's margin, but its practical effect will arrive with the 2027 regularisation, that is, in 2028. Documenting from now on the periods of receipt of the benefit - recognition decisions, medical reports submitted, registrations and changes in the RETA - will avoid depending on after-the-fact documentary reconstruction when the Treasury carries out the year's adjustment.

The change operates from 1 January 2027 and takes shape in the amendment of article 309 of the General Social Security Law, which regulates the contributions excluded from the annual regularisation of the self-employed. Under the new wording, the bases for periods of receipt of the benefit for caring for minors with cancer or other serious illness become definitive from the outset, without waiting for the Tax Agency's income communication or the later check by the General Treasury of Social Security.

Practising professionals can resolve classification doubts through the consultation channels of the professional bars, and the basic concepts of the contribution system are covered in the legal dictionary.

Frequently asked questions

What changes for self-employed carers in 2027?

The contribution bases for the periods in which they receive the benefit for caring for minors with cancer or other serious illness are excluded from the annual regularisation and become definitive.

Which rule regulates it?

RDL 31/2026, of 20 October (BOE-A-2026-21872), which amends article 309 of the LGSS. The measure enters into force on 1 January 2027, under its fourth final provision.

What other periods are excluded from regularisation?

Temporary incapacity, risk during pregnancy and breastfeeding, birth and care of a minor, shared care of an infant, cessation of activity and cyclical or sectoral activity-sustainability benefits, always with continued registration in the RETA.

Does it mean paying lower quotas?

It is not a general cut: the bases of the protected periods simply are not adjusted later against actual income. The rest of the year remains subject to ordinary regularisation.

When will it be felt?

In the regularisation of the 2027 year, which the Treasury will carry out once the Tax Agency communicates the final income.

Sources

• El Periodico, "Los autonomos que cuidan de hijos con cancer u otra enfermedad grave no tendran que ajustar sus bases de cotizacion en 2027", 4 November 2026 (consulted on 10 November 2026).

The regulatory reference (RDL 31/2026, BOE-A-2026-21872, article 309 LGSS and fourth final provision) comes from the cited press report; direct access to the BOE was unavailable at the time of writing.