[Poland] Certificates of employment – changes from September

On 7 September 2019, the amendment of the provisions on employment certificates will enter into force. What changes will be introduced by the new regulations?

Date of issue of the certificate of employment

The amendment to the Labour Code signed by the President assumes that in the event of termination or expiration of the employment relationship, the employer is obliged to issue an employment certificate to the employee on the date of termination of the employment, if within 7 days of that date they do not intend to establish another employment relationship with a given person. If, within 7 days of the termination of the employment, another employment relationship is entered into with the employee, the certificate of employment should be issued only at the employee’s request. The employee is obliged to submit such a request at least one day before the termination of the employment relationship.

If for objective reasons it is not possible to issue a certificate of employment at the latest on the day of termination of the employment relationship, the employer shall have 7 days to send it or otherwise deliver it to the employee or to a person authorised by the employee.

Correction of the certificate of employment – longer period of time

From 7 September 2019 the employee will have more time to apply to the employer for a correction of the certificate of employment. They now have 7 days from the date of receipt of the certificate to do so, and this period will be extended to 14 days after the changes come into force. In the case of refusal to correct the certificate of employment by the employer, the employee within 14 days of receiving the refusal, will be able to apply for a correction of the certificate to the employment court.

Another change will be the abolition of the obligation for the employer to indicate to the employee the competent district court – the court of employment, to which he should submit a request for correction of the certificate of employment.

Permanent destruction of the previous employment certificate

According to the amended regulations, once a corrected certificate of employment has been issued to an employee, the employer will remove the previous certificate of employment from the employee’s personal files in a permanent manner (which makes it impossible to reconstruct it).

Certificate of employment with photocode

The draft regulation on certificates of employment also introduces facilitations for visually impaired people. The planned changes would include the addition of QR codes (photocodes) on each page of the auxiliary model of certificate of employment. The photocode will contain information about the type of document, page numbers, page orientation and the total number of pages. On the last page of the model, the place of signing would be indicated. A draft of this change is currently in the consultation phase.

Learn more:
Amendment to the Minimum Wage Act

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