Action Plans

What problem does the commitment aim to address?

The commitment aims to raise the level of protection of free choice of job by employees of the Republic of Armenia and the labor law, as well as to manage the risks in the field of labor law. Employers, especially in the private sector, very often do not conclude employment contracts with newly hired employees or do not provide the individual legal act on employment, job description or employment contract to the employees, which later makes the implementation of protection of employment rights of employees difficult, and sometimes even impossible. It turns out that, in the course of inspection and supervision activities, the cases when employers register an employee's employment application via the taxservice.am system but the very contract or employment order is not drawn up and ratified by the employer and the employee in order to avoid fines imposed by the tax body, are often. And already during the inspection, an ex post facto employment contract is drawn up in hard copy, signed by the employee and submitted as a previously signed document. A related problem is also when the employee is recruited for such a position (staff position unit) in the case of which preliminary and therefore periodic medical examination is mandatory. Moreover, the cases when private sector employers specify the amount of salary in employment contracts in the amount of the minimum monthly salary provided for by law, for the purpose of avoiding tax and other state payments prescribed by legislation, about which the employee often does not have any information due to not having the opportunity to familiarize himself or herself with the contract, are often. Another problem is when a person is employed performing work required by the employer, corresponding to his or her profession, but due to not concluding an employment contract or due to the fact that referral tasks that differ from the actual work performed are prescribed in the contract concluded for another position (staff position unit) instead of the work actually performed, he or she is further unable to justify that he or she has performed professional work, and does not receive both the increments and other social guarantees provided for by law. For example, a person, by actually performing professional work which is at the same time provided for by the legislation of the Republic of Armenia in the list of particularly difficult, particularly harmful jobs, professions and positions, is registered by the employer for another position (staff position) in the relevant company, in order to not pay the supplements provided for by law, not provide other social guarantees envisaged for the mentioned jobs, and later the person having performed the mentioned work is deprived of both the opportunity to calculate the professional work performed by him or her in the professional work record and the supplements available to him or her and other social guarantees provided for by the state. In the public sector, we often come across cases when the employee is provided with the individual legal act on employment, but the job description is not provided attached to the order, as a result of which the state servant carries out the instructions issued by his or her direct superior, without having a clear idea of his or her main work duties.

The above-stated problems are especially common in marzes and small communities, but similar problems are regularly revealed during inspections in the city of Yerevan as well. Among the affected groups, we can single out persons who are socially disadvantaged, have a low level of legal consciousness, have no opportunity to be employed in a job other than the proposed conditions, and who hold low level positions (staff position units) in the public sector. The absence of an electronic system for record-registration of employment contracts enables employers to demonstrate a bad faith approach to employees by not providing the terms of the contract and distorting them, deprives employees of effective remedies for the protection of their rights, and the inspection body — of an effective toolkit for supervision. Effective inspection supervision in the field of labor — of which the electronic system for record-registration of employment contracts will become an integral part and a supervision toolkit — will create an opportunity to minimize similar cases.

Employers have considered the mandatory existence of an employment contract or its provision to employees as unimportant. Besides, even if an employment contract is concluded, the next problem is its content or the reflection of the minimum conditions prescribed by the labor legislation of the Republic of Armenia (for example, the year, month, day of starting work, the validity period of the employment contract, the type (minimum, additional, extended) and duration of annual leave, remuneration, etc.). According to the current legislation, the employment contract clearly provides for the job functions, the amount of the basic salary and/or the manner of determining it, the supplements, increments, additional payments given to employees in the manner prescribed, the duration of the work time and the rest time, etc., but in practice the employees are actually required to perform functions not provided for by the employment contract for an amount other than the amount of salary specified in the contract, the supplements, increments, additional payments are not provided, the duration of the work time and rest time is not observed, etc. At the same time, the employment contract is not provided to the employees in order not to register their work activities with the tax authority (illegal work) or to register an amount of salary less than that actually provided, as well as in order to avoid applications-complaints addressed by the employee to the employer or the inspection body in case of violation of the terms of the contracts.

Moreover, often employers conclude contracts on service provision with employees instead of employment contracts for the purpose of circumventing the basic principles and guarantees of the labor legislation.

These problems became more apparent during the pandemic (Covid-19) and the war. Unregulated labor law and relations led to the lack of protection of employee's rights, and the lack of sufficient toolkit for the inspection body to conduct regulation and supervision.

To digitalize employment contracts (individual legal acts on employment) concluded both in the public and private sectors of the Republic of Armenia through the introduction of an electronic system (platform) of record-registration of employment contracts in the Republic of Armenia for the purpose of improving the system for free choice of job by employees and protection of labor rights.

The electronic management platform will provide an opportunity for employees to have employment contracts meeting the requirements prescribed by the legislation of the Republic of Armenia, and for the inspection body — to have a toolkit to exercise a more transparent, accountable, controllable and right-based protection.

In particular, it is envisaged to post sample forms of employment contracts (individual legal acts on employment) in the electronic system (platform) in accordance with the requirements of labor legislation, which will give employees the opportunity to be informed about in what parts the employment contracts concluded with them (or individual legal acts on their employment) do not meet the requirements of legislation, and provide employers with the opportunity to conclude employment contracts (adopt individual legal acts on employment) in compliance with the requirements prescribed by legislation. Moreover, employees will have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the content of their contracts, and — in case of violation of the terms of the contract —file a complaint to both the employer and the inspection body by making a reference to the specific point of the contract. Whereas the inspection body will have the opportunity to exercise effective supervision based on both monitoring and the complaints filed, by identifying violations of labor legislation, including the terms of the employment contract, and improve the rights and protection of employees. At the same time, based on the results of the analysis of the problems revealed, the inspection body will have the opportunity to evaluate and determine more effectively the employers with a high level of risk for the purpose of involving them in the annual inspection program. In addition, the availability of the platform will preclude the established practice in the private sector of concluding ex post facto contracts, not registering the actual work performed with the tax authority (illegal work) or specifying in the contract an amount less than the actual salary provided. At the same time, the access to the content of the contract published on the platform will provide an opportunity to exclude cases of concluding contacts on service provision by employers in the private sector instead of concluding employment contracts with their employees.

Moreover, it is envisaged to publish on the platform statistic data about the main (frequently) repeated violations revealed by the inspection body during the supervision over the field of labor reserved thereto and about cases of restoration of the rights of stakeholders through appropriate administrative enforcement measures, as a result of which the level of awareness of both employees and their representatives, as well as employers in the field of protection of labor law will increase significantly; for example, the parties to the contract will have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the mainly repeated violations in the field of labor law and avoid them, and where similar violations have already been committed — correct them.

To digitalize employment contracts (individual legal acts on employment) concluded both in the public and private sectors of the Republic of Armenia through the introduction of an electronic system (platform) of record-registration of employment contracts in the Republic of Armenia for the purpose of improving the system for free choice of job by employees and protection of labor rights.

For the purpose of improving and increasing the effectiveness of the toolkit for state supervision over labor legislation, it is recommended to introduce an electronic system (platform) for record-registration of employment contracts, which will contribute to the conclusion of employment contracts by employers in the manner prescribed by legislation, not artificially transferring activities presuming labor relations to the civil law field, and registering work activities in the tax field in the manner prescribed by legislation — the concluded employment contracts will be available at any time in a simultaneous mode. The procedure for concluding employment contracts is violated by employers due to the lack of knowledge of labor legislation, and it is envisaged to provide sample forms of employment contracts (individual legal acts on employment) in the electronic system (platform) for solving the problem. Statistic data on the main (frequently) repeated violations revealed by the inspection body during the supervision and the cases of restoration of the rights of stakeholders through relevant administrative enforcement measures, and statistic data on the risk level of employers will be published on the platform, as well as employees will be given the opportunity to publish (make public) their employment contracts containing personal data on the same platform, as needed and desired. 

The introduction of the electronic system for record-registration of employment contracts implies itself the definition of relevant legal regulations in accordance with law. In particular, the law (Labor Code of the Republic of Armenia) will define the duty of employers to enter the contracts or individual legal acts (with the relevant job description) into the platform after recruiting but no later than before the end of the day preceding the day of actually starting the work by the given employee, and in case of actually starting the work on the day of being employed — by 14:00 of the day of being recruited, and in case of contracts concluded via the platform — at the moment of signing thereof. For violating the mentioned duty, the law (Administrative Offences Code of the Republic of Armenia) will provide for imposition of an administrative penalty, as well as power to issue instructions (executive orders) to the economic entity (the Law of the Republic of Armenia "On inspections"). Moreover, in case of failure to exercise the mentioned duty, the inspection body will have the competence to initiate administrative proceedings based on both the complaints filed by employees and the cases revealed by it during the supervision exercised thereby or based on the information received during the work activities, by applying relevant enforcement measures against the economic entities. Integration of the system of employment contracts to the https://e-citizen.am/ platform. With this action, citizens can find their employment contracts along with data regarding their passport, registration, driver's license, movable property, family status, Compulsory Enforcement Service, notary, education and other data, as well as be informed about which bodies have made requests for those data.