Increasingly, companies hire remote workers who work from home. The staff does not spend time for travel to office, and the employer pays for the result. Is it necessary to conclude an employment contract with such workers?
An employment contract with home-based workers is concluded in the same way as with other employees.
According to Art. 21 of the Labor Code (hereinafter – Labor Code) an employment contract is an agreement between an employee and the owner of a company, institution, organization, or authorized body under which the employee undertakes to perform work in accordance with his/her qualifications and to be subject to an internal labor code. In its turn, the owner of the company or the authorized body must pay salary to the employee and provide the necessary working conditions stipulated by labor legislation, collective agreement and agreement of the parties.
Before entering into a contract, the employer must check the working conditions of the home-based worker, examine his/her housing and living conditions. Representatives of the trade union of the enterprise (authorized representative of the labor collective), as well as, if necessary, connected with the nature of the further work of the home-based worker, should take part in such an examination – representatives of sanitary and fire supervision. The results of the survey are executed by the relevant act.
Home-based workers are people who entered into an employment contract with the company on the performance of work from home personally from materials and using work equipment that were given by the employer or purchased at his/her expense, as well as from his/her own materials and using personal mechanisms and instruments with permission of management.
Subparagraph 1.1 of the Guidelines on the Definition of Workplaces, approved by the Protocol of the Labor Ministry No. 4 of 21.06.1995, also stipulates that home-based workers are employees whose working place coincides geographically with their place of residence.
Home-based job can be considered as a work, which a person called the home-based worker, performs:
- at the place of residence or in other premises of his/her own choice, but not in the premises of the employer;
- for remuneration;
- in order to produce goods or services in accordance with the instructions of the employer, regardless of who supplies the equipment, materials or other resources used, unless the person has the degree of autonomy and economic independence necessary for it to be considered independent employee in accordance with national legislation or court decisions.
Home-based work requires accounting both for the volume of work performed, and for hours worked, that is, the application of standardized tasks.
