Criada Medida de Apoio à Contratação - Compromisso Emprego Sustentável

Ordinance No. 38/2022, of January 17, was approved, which creates and regulates the Sustainable Employment Commitment measure.

The Sustainable Employment Commitment is an exceptional and transitory measure and consists of an incentive for the permanent employment of unemployed persons registered with the Instituto do Emprego e da Formação Profissional, I.P. (IEFP). It combines financial support for hiring, financial support for the payment of social security contributions, support that can be combined with measures to encourage employment of a fiscal or quasi-fiscal nature.

Below we identify the main requirements for accessing this measure.

Eligible Employers

• natural or legal persons of a private nature, whether for profit or not (includes entities that have started a PER, RERE SIREVE, provided that certain formalities are fulfilled).

Additional requirements of employers

• Registration and regular constitution;

• Fulfill the legal requirements required for the exercise of the activity or provide proof of having started the applicable process;

• Tax and contributory status regularized;

• Not being in default with respect to financial support granted by the IEFP;

• Situation regularized in terms of refunds within the scope of financing from the European Structural and Investment Funds;

• Organized accounting;

• Not having arrears of salary payments.

Requirements for granting financial support

• Publication and registration of job offers, on the portal https://iefponline.iefp.pt/, signaled with the intention of applying for the measure;

• Signing of an employment contract with an unemployed person enrolled in the IEFP. Net job creation is understood when the entity reaches, through the supported employment contract, a number of workers higher than the average number of workers registered in the 12 months preceding the month in which the offer is registered;

• Net job creation and maintenance of the level of employment achieved through support;

• Provision of professional training during the duration of the support (training in a work context with a tutor or 50 hours of training by a certified entity);

• Remuneration offered must comply with the guaranteed minimum monthly remuneration (RMMG) or, when applicable, with a collective labor regulation instrument.

The employment contract can be concluded before the application is submitted, provided that it is later than the registration of the job offer on the IEFP platform.

The analysis criteria are related to the hiring of unemployed people with greater difficulty in integrating into the labor market, namely young people and people with disabilities. These criteria will be defined in the notice of application opening.

Eligible recipients (namely)

• Unemployed enrolled in the IEFP for at least 6 consecutive months;

• Unemployed registered with the IEFP for at least 2 consecutive months in the case of a person aged 35 or over or 45 years of age or over;

• Unemployed registered with the IEFP (exemption from the minimum registration period) who benefits from unemployment benefit or social insertion income, person with a disability and incapacity, person who is part of a single-parent family, person whose spouse or person with whom he/she lives in a de facto union is is also unemployed, registered with the IEFP.

The Ordinance clarifies that the registration time is not affected by the frequency of a professional internship, professional training or other active employment measures, with the exception of measures to directly support hiring and those aimed at creating their own employment.

Eligible employment contracts

• Permanent employment contracts;

• For example, a contract concluded with an unemployed person who has attended an internship financed by the IEFP in the same entity or entity belonging to the same business group in the previous 12 months is not eligible.

Employers are required to maintain the supported work contract and the level of employment achieved through the financial support for at least 24 months from the first month of the supported contract (this obligation does not apply, for example, if the worker terminates the contract on his own initiative, if there is a dismissal for just cause promoted by the employer). This obligation is verified every six months.

Financial support for hiring

Financial support for the contract corresponding to 12 times (i.e. EUR 5,318) the value of the social support index (the IAS is set at EUR 443.20).

Increases in the following situations (cumulative with each other up to a limit of 3):

• 25%, when it comes to hiring young people aged up to and including 35 years old;

• 35%, when it comes to hiring people with disabilities;

• 25%, when the base remuneration associated with the supported contract is equal to or greater than twice the value of the RMMG;

• 25%, when the job is located in the interior, under the legal terms;

• By 25%, when the employer is party to a collective bargaining agreement (IRCT).

Financial support for the payment of social security contributions

Financial support corresponding to half of the value of the social security contribution payable by you, in relation to supported work contracts, during the first year of its validity. This support cannot exceed the limit of seven times the value of the IAS (i.e. EUR 3,102)

Payment of financial support

Payment of financial support is made after submission of the acceptance term to the IEFP, in three installments, as follows:

a) 60% of the amount of financial support is paid after the start of validity of all supported work contracts, within a maximum period of 20 working days after their submission to the IEFP;

b) 20% of the value of the financial support is paid in the 13th month of validity of the last contract started;

c) 20% of the value of the financial support is paid in the 25th month of the last contract started.

Payments are subject to verification that the necessary requirements for granting financial support are maintained. The last payment depends on the delivery, by the employer, of the internal training report or a copy of the training certificate.

Relation to the ATIVAR.PT Incentive measure - during the validity of this measure, applications for the ATIVAR.PT Incentive support are not accepted (article 11 of Ordinance no. 122-A/2021, of June 14).

This regime takes effect on January 18, 2022.

For additional details, please contact us:[e-mail].