[Czech Republic] Liberalization of measures

On 23^rd April 2020 Municipal court in Prague annulled four extraordinary measures relating to epidemic of COVID-19.

CZECH REPUBLIC

Those measures limited retail sale and free movement of persons. The reason why the Court annulled the measures is that the measures were issued by the Ministry of Health based on Law on protection of public health, not by government based on Emergency Law; with this procedure government probably wanted to withdraw from its obligations to reimburse business damages caused by these measures. The Court noted that measures must be issued based on the Emergency Law, therefore the Court annulled the measures with effect from 27^th April 2020, while gave to the government time to issue measures in accordance with a law.

In response to these facts, the government decided to speed up the plan of liberalization of measures. As of Monday, 27^th April 2020 church services with less than 16 people are allowed, stores with sales area up to 2500 m² can be opened, as can be driving school, libraries, ZOOs and gyms. Of course, strict hygiene rules must be followed. Two weeks later hairdressing saloons and outdoor spaces of restaurants are scheduled to be allowed to open. Another two weeks later even inner spaces of restaurants, hotels, culture and sport events (with limited number of participants) and tattoo saloons are scheduled to be allowed to open.

Twenty-five program

Law on compensation bonus for self-employed took effect on 15^th April 2020. This law provides to all self-employed people who were affected by coronavirus crises, 500 CZK for each calendar day of set time period. The period lasts from 12^th March 2020 to 30^th April 2020 (might by prolonged) and only a person who is a participant of the state pension scheme based on self-employment can receive the bonus. Another condition is that this person can’t be insured based on law on sickness insurance as an employee. Therefore, this person can work as an employee based on agreement to complete a work if the gross salary is up to 10.000 CZK per month or based on small-scope employment (main employment contract or agreement on work activity) with salary less than 3.000 CZK per month. In that case agreed salary also has to be less than this limit, otherwise it wouldn’t be “small-scope employment”. Self-employed person can’t receive the bonus for days of interruption in activity. Bonus is truly a tax bonus and as a tax bonus it is tax exempted. Bonus isn’t affected by seizures and can’t be set off against a different tax due. The application for bonus is easy to fill; you can fill it here.

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