Any business which employs more than 25 FTE employees is required to give jobs to the handicapped, with the mandatory quota being set at 4%. Employers have various options (which can also be combined) as to how to meet this requirement under the law.
As of 2018, the framework for fulfilling the mandatory hiring quota for the handicapped has undergone major changes. If you employ more than 25 FTEs within the meaning of Decree No. 518/2004 Coll., you are obliged to employ a certain proportion of handicapped individuals, calculated based upon the average annual number of FTE employees. The manner in which the mandatory employment quota for handicapped employees is to be calculated is included in Decree No. 518/2004 Coll. The quota is essentially 4 % of the average annual headcount (adjusted to full-time equivalents), and must be reported to the competent labor office for any given year by 15 February of the following year.
Handicapped persons are persons who have been recognized by the social security authority:
- as disabled in the third degree (individuals with serious handicaps),
- as disabled in the first or second degree,
- as disadvantaged because of their health status.
Employers may decide to fulfill this obligation in various ways, which can also be combined:
- hire handicapped persons within the context of regular employment,
- procure goods and services from companies whose staff is more than 50 % composed of handicapped persons working in newly created or defined sheltered jobs,
- award contracts to employers who employ handicapped persons,
- procure goods and services from handicapped persons who are self-employed without any employees of their own,
- pay a levy for failing to meet the quota.
On 1 October 2017, an amendment to the Employment Act (Act No. 435/2004 Coll.) has come into force which requires the suppliers of “substitute performances” (by which employers may meet the quota requirement without actually hiring handicapped persons, see the second and further bullet points above) to enter their performances into an electronic record kept by the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. The same applies to the consumer of such substitute performances, who must also register this fact in the electronic records kept by the Ministry, though only after they received the relevant documentation from the supplier.
Source: Act No. 206/2017 Coll., Decree No. 518/2004 Coll.