Amendments affecting employees in Hungary

Protection for pregnant women

According to the original wording of the Hungary Labour Code, pregnant women and women undergoing fertility treatment are protected against dismissal under labour law if their status is disclosed to their employer before notice of dismissal is received.  
 
However, in 2014 the Constitutional Court in its decision no. 17/2014 (V.30.) stated that the requirement to provide prior notice as a condition of protection infringed the employee’s right to keep personal information private and imposed an unnecessary restriction on the employee’s right to a private life, therefore effectively changing the position so that a pregnant employee was not required to disclose her pregnancy to her employer as a condition of having protection against dismissal.

The intention of the present proposal is to clarify and to enable the employer to withdraw notice of dismissal within 15 days where the employee does not disclose her pregnancy until after the employer’s notice. The period between the notice and its withdrawal is to be considered as employment and salary payable. This provision came into force on 18 June 2016.

Stand-by jobs and rest periods

For employees working on a stand-by basis, the entitlement to a subsequent period of uninterrupted 8 hour rest period has been replaced by a period of 11 hours rest. Employees shall be given at least 11 hours of uninterrupted rest after the conclusion of daily work and before the beginning of the next days’ work (daily rest period).
 
Eight hours of daily rest may be provided to employees working in:
a) split shifts;
b) continuous shifts;
c) multiple shifts;
d) in seasonal jobs
  
provided that, if the employer provides less than 11 hours rest to an employee between two periods of work, then the next rest period must be of sufficient length to ensure the employee has 22 hours in total for the two consecutive daily rest periods. Therefore, if a rest period of 8 hours was given to the employee on Monday, then on Tuesday and before working on Wednesday – the rest period should be at least 14 hours.

Promotion of mobility

From 01 January 2017 the tax free element of payments made in respect of travel will be increased from 9 HUF/km to 15 HUF/km. This is also the case for teleworkers for return journeys between the premises of the employer and the place of actual performance of work if these are located in different cities and if no public transport can be taken for such a journey.
 
In the future, where accommodation rental support is provided by the employer it will be tax free as follows:
 
a) in the first 24 months of the employment: 40% of the minimum wage;
b) from 24-48 months of the employment: 25% of the minimum wage;
c) from 48-60  months of the employment: maximum 15% of the minimum wage

Further information

For further information or to discuss any of the issues raised, please contact Kinga Zempleni (kinga.zempleni@zempleni.org) on +36 3063 98936.
 

Disclaimer

Content is for general information purposes only. The information provided is not intended to be comprehensive and it does not constitute or contain legal or other advice. If you require assistance in relation to any issue please seek specific advice relevant to your particular circumstances. In particular, no responsibility shall be accepted by the authors or by Abbiss Cadres LLP for any losses occasioned by reliance on any content appearing on or accessible from this article. For further legal information click here.

Circular 230 disclosure

To ensure compliance with requirements imposed by the IRS and other taxing authorities, we inform you that any tax advice contained in this article (including any attachments) is not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used, for the purpose of (i) avoiding penalties that may be imposed on any taxpayer or (ii) promoting, marketing or recommending to another party any transaction or matter addressed herein.