Romania like many countries in the European Union is suffering from high unemployment. Whether this is shown in official figures or in the public awareness of the Romanian black market there is a large number of young people and graduates who are without permanent employment.
To try and resolve some of the problems relating to this the Government passed Law 335/2013 regarding the temporary employment of higher education graduates (the “Internship Law”). This law is in line with the EU strategy for reducing unemployment levels and aims to provide better work and training conditions for young people. The Internship Law implements the framework provisions on internship from the Romanian Labour Code.
Our employment lawyers are asked more and more about this Internship Law. So as a Romanian law firm always seeking to advise and educate our clients I thought that this week’s blog would be about this, so I have worked on it with one of my Romanian lawyers for whose assistance I am grateful.
In order to have a valid internship under the Internship Law companies need to enter into labour contracts with the graduate. The labour contract has to include a specific provision that an additional internship agreement must be entered into by the company and the graduate. The internship agreement becomes an annex to the labour contract and is concluded for a six-month period (the duration of the internship imposed by the Internship Law), except for cases when a special time period is set forth by a particular piece of legislation.
The intern receives a monthly salary as well as all the other employee protections under the labour contract, and performs work, carrying out his or her activity based on a plan reflecting the intern’s objectives and performance targets, that is approved by the company. Each participating company must appoint an internship mentor who is allowed to coordinate and supervise not more than three (3) interns simultaneously.
Before the internship is completed, an appraisal committee, also appointed by the company, drafts a report about the intern (highlighting the activities, objectives achieved, performance indicators, competencies and skills, behaviour, degree of involvement, etc.). At the same time, the intern must draft a self-appraisal report regarding the activities carried out during the internship period. Both reports must be considered by the company before a decision is taken as to the completion of the internship and the continuation or termination of the labour contract. The procedural steps to be followed in both cases are to be laid out by the methodological norms to the Internship Law, which are to be adopted in the following months.
If the appraisal is unsatisfactory, the labour contract may be terminated without notice and the company may employ another higher education graduate for the same position, based on an internship agreement. This can only be done once. The intern may challenge the company’s decision, first internally, by filing a complaint with the company and, subsequently, in court, within 30 days from the company’s response issued further to the initial internal complaint.
The company may contractually impose a retention period during which the intern may not initiate the termination of the labour contract for a given duration if, during the internship period, the intern has benefited from professional training — under the sanction of incurring relevant costs — as demonstrated by the company.
Companies entering into an internship agreement may receive a monthly monetary incentive currently approximately €170 per month.
Whilst the law on the face of it appears to assist in the reduction in the level of unemployment the difficulties in removing and the ability of the employee to take steps to challenge the employers decision may act as a deterrent rather than an incentive to temporarily hire interns under this law. The black market may still prevail.
