Employee relations

Greece's Labor Ministry is planning to crack down on employers using old and new tricks in order to dodge inspections and get away with breaking labor regulations.
The ministry will not only target employers who haven't registered their employees but also those under-report the hours they work.

Failure by individuals within the competent agencies of the state or local authority officials to send the required documents for the licensing of strategic investments within the given deadline will be punished with a minimum suspension of three months, according to the investment incentives bill that the Development Ministry has put up for consultation until Tuesday.

The Confederation of Labour Podkrepa will ask for a minimum wage of 1000 BGN to be set in the budget for 2020, since this minimum wage currently corresponds approximately to the labor productivity. This was stated by the economic adviser of the trade union Vanya Grigorova, who participates in a forum for the rights of posted workers, organized by the trade union, BTA reported.

The leadership of the Labor Ministry is considering introducing an "exemption clause" for the obligatory implementation of a sector-specific collective labor contract for companies on the verge of shutting down. It is possible that such a regulation will be included in the draft law for investment incentives to be tabled in Parliament this week.

The Sofia Municipal Council has adopted a three-year programme to increase the wages of public transport drivers by 10% annually, Focus News Agency reports. This has been agreed by Mayor Yordanka Fandakova, the trade unions and the directors of all Sofia public transport companies. The programme will start running in 2020.

For the tenth consecutive year, Bulgaria is the last in the European Union in pay of overtime work. In 2018 an average of 5.5 euros was paid for an extra hour of work, according to data from the European Statistics Agency Eurostat.

In recent years, workplace loyalty has taken a backseat as millennial workers constantly weigh up their options, moving jobs every two-three years. So, what can businesses do to make their organization a place that people want to work?