End February 2017, the draft amendments of Labour Law were published that intend to revise remuneration of overtime amount, specify dismissal procedures of employee, competition restrictions application, critical remarks by employer or reprimand cancellation procedure, certain clarifications regarding the right for extra work and the employer’s possibilities to limit it, employer training reimbursement arrangements in case of termination notice of employee, hourly wage calculation procedure specified and other amendments.
Overtime. Regarding an employee performing overtime work, for the first two overtime hours that have been completed above the daily normal working time, a supplement payment not less than 50% will be paid. Further, for each subsequent overtime, as it is so far, a premium of 100% will have to be paid. The amount of premium for a public holiday is not changed currently – it is 100% of the employee’s daily wage rate. If the employee has a flexible working hours with one month reporting period, 50% premium for overtime work is to be paid for the first 20 overtime hours. The employee and employer may agree that instead of the premium for overtime, an employer may grant a paid rest in another time.
Termination notice. The draft amendments include several provisions of the employer’s right to terminate the employment, for example, employment termination immediately due to the employee’s health inability to perform the work concluded confirmed by a statement of doctor. In accordance with the draft law, the provisions on the prohibition to terminate the work of an employee with a disability, in bill authors’ view, does not protect employees with disabilities but creates barriers for hiring. The termination notice due to important reasons has also been specified in the said draft amendments.
Breaks in work. According to the project, if the employee during break is not allowed to leave a place of work and cannot use break time upon his/her discretion, it should be counted as working time. Further, if the employee during break cannot leave the premises of the employer but there is a possibility to take a break anyway, the employee during such break is not obliged to perform duties and a break will not be counted as working time.
The draft law is currently in the harmonization process in ministries. The detailed information of planned changes will be available following discussions and adoption of the draft law in the Parliament.
