Labor Law – A Document No One is Satisfied With

Lose-lose situation. These three words succinctly describe the current state with yet another Amendment to the Labor Law, with which neither side is satisfied. It cannot be expected that the usually opposing sides, unions and employers, share common views, but these legislative changes have once again deeply divided and ‘waged war’ between employers and workers. Everyone is dissatisfied with the proposed compromise solutions, except for the Government.

– The amendments to the Law were supposed to resolve three basic issues: regulating remote work, so-called platform workers, and fixed-term work. And nothing has been resolved from all of that. The only thing we welcome is the fact that in the future, salaries below the minimum wage cannot be contracted – said Tomislav Kiš, the Secretary General of the New Union.

According to him, for remote work, it was necessary to define compensation for expenses per hour or per day for the worker, and not for that compensation to be realized only if such work lasts longer than 10 calendar days in a month, to prescribe which activities cannot be done from home, and if the intention of the Law was to encompass as many workers as possible under the collective agreement, since this is mentioned as one of the reasons for the amendments to the Labor Law, then better conditions for collective bargaining should have been enabled.

– The planned amendments to the Law protect platforms from workers, which is contrary to the European directive that is yet to be adopted, which would regulate this form of work. I do not know if it is a matter of malice or corruption, but I really do not see the reason why the Law should protect platforms. What is the state’s interest here? – asks Kiš.

How will working hours be recorded?

It is known that many workers perform delivery or passenger transport services through so-called aggregators in a way that they are ‘registered’ for only two hours a day, although they work significantly more hours, and such practice seems to continue to be allowed. However, if a person earns more than 60 percent of the gross amount of three monthly minimum wages through a digital platform in a given quarter of the calendar year, they will be considered employed, meaning they will have to have an employment contract.

This compromise solution, unions believe, will ultimately result in algorithms of digital platforms assigning work to deliverers at an amount of 59 percent of the gross salary.

From the Union of Digital Platform Workers, they requested in public consultation that the new law include time control through the Tax Administration and fiscalized receipts for each person working through digital platforms to truly sanction undeclared work, but the keeping of work records has been left to the platforms. The question is, says our interlocutor who participated in the working group for the amendments to the Labor Law, what exactly digital platforms will report as working time – time spent ‘online’ or just driving time, i.e., delivery time, without waiting for job assignment.

On the other hand, the regulation of work on digital work platforms is one of the few things that the Croatian Employers’ Association is satisfied with.

– In addition, we are satisfied with the regulations regarding the termination of employment upon reaching 65 years of age, the possibility of extending the probationary period under certain conditions, and the possibility of delivering a greater number of employer decisions electronically – they say in HUP.

About which provisions are still contentious, what craftsmen, employers, and unions think about the amendments to the Law, and what innovations the new Labor Law brings, read in the new printed and digital edition of Lider.