Slovak law differentiates between employees and self-employed individuals. Employees have different statuses depending on whether they are employed under an employment contract or one of the so-called contracts on works performed outside employment.

The employment contract may be concluded for

• an indefinite or
• a defined period of time.

The employment may be agreed upon in the form of

• a full-time job, or
• a part-time job, including job sharing type of employment, in which employees distribute amongst themselves the working time and the duties appertaining to the job.

The Labor Code also allows home-work and telework, in which an employee performs work for an employer at home or at another agreed place, pursuant to conditions agreed in the employment contract or performs work in a similar manner using information technology.

Besides an employment contract, the Labour Code recognizes three other contract types (contracts on works performed outside employment):

• work performance contract,
• work activities contract and
• temporary student job contract.

The employment contract should in principle be executed in writing in Slovak (a bilingual version is also acceptable) and the employer shall be obliged to provide the employee with one written copy of the employment contract. The Labor Code does not consider employment agreed only orally as null and void. It, however, constitutes a breach of law on the employer’s side which might be penalized by the Labor Inspectorate.

The employment contract must contain the following prerequisites defined by the Labor Code:

• the type of work to be carried out and its brief description;
• the place of work or places of work, if more than one; or a rule that the place of work shall be determined by the employee;
• the job commencement date; and
• the wage (salary) conditions, if they are not agreed in a collective agreement (if any).

Yes. A part-time employee, an employee with home-work or telework type of employment, as well as an employee performing work occasionally or temporarily through a home office, may neither be privileged nor discriminated against when compared to a full-time employee working at a similar position.

In principle no, but there are exceptional situations described below with a similar effect.

The employer or the agency for temporary employment may agree in writing with an employee on his/her temporary assignation to another employee (legal person or natural person).

Based on the Acquired Rights Directive (also referred to as "TUPE"), if the employer as an economic unit or its part, or an employer's task or activity, or part thereof, is transferred to another employer, the rights and obligations from employment relationships towards the transferred employees shall pass to the employer-transferee.

No later than one month before the transfer of rights and obligations from employment relationships, the employer shall inform employee representatives (trade union, works council, or employee trustee) or, if no employee representatives operate at the employer, the employees directly, in writing, of

• the date or proposed date of the transfer;
• reasons for the transfer;
• the employment, economic and social implications of the transfer for the employees;
• the planned transfer measures applying to employees

Transfer measures applying to employees shall be negotiated with the employee representatives if existing at the workplace, at least one month in advance.

If a transfer means that the working conditions of an employee will undergo fundamental change, and if the employee does not agree to such change and notifies his express position in this regard to the employer, employment shall be deemed terminated by agreement as of the date of transfer. The employer shall issue a written confirmation of such termination of employment. In such a case, the employee is entitled to financial compensation the same as in the case of redundancy.

No specific rights exist based on such a situation.

An employer may transfer an employee without his or her consent for a period necessary to carry out work other than agreed in the employment contract if such transfer is necessary to avert an emergency or mitigate its immediate consequences.

The employer is obliged to transfer the employee to different work in certain specific cases stipulated by the Labor Code, such as:

• when it is necessary for the protection of the employee (e.g. medical reasons, pregnancy, breastfeeding),

• when it is necessary for the protection of other persons/public (e.g. quarantine measure), or

• when it is necessary pursuant to a final decision of a court or other competent authority.

In the above cases (where the employer is obliged to transfer the employee), the employer shall pre-negotiate such transfer, its reason and duration, with the employee. If the transfer entails any change to the employment contract, the employer shall issue the employee a written notice containing the reason and duration of the transfer to the different work.

If the employee is transferred to different work due to a risk of occupational disease, a quarantine measure or measures to avert an emergency or mitigate its immediate consequences and his or her recalculated wage is lower than the original wage agreed in the employment contract, the employee shall be entitled to an extra payment up to at least the amount of his or her average earnings achieved before the transfer.

Additionally, an employer must provide an employee with a list of specific information on working conditions and conditions of employment (unless these are included in the employment contract). The list of information encompasses for example the length of vacation, information on maturity and payment of wages (including pay dates), the weekly working time, the method and rules for the distribution of working time, including the expected working days and reference time periods in case of specific working time distribution etc. If the specific information will be provided in a separate document from the employment contract, the employer has the authority to unilaterally modify and update such document in the future without necessitating the employee's consent.

At the same time, the Slovak legislative body has kept in force certain provisions that apply in times of an emergency, state of emergency, and state of distress. These provisions empower the employer, under specific conditions, to unilaterally order the employee to perform work through home-office, if the agreed type of work allows it.

No, it is not an employment-at-will jurisdiction. Under Slovak law, an employment relationship may be terminated upon:

• written mutual agreement;
• notice on termination;
• immediate termination;
• expiry of the employment contract concluded for a definite period of time;
• termination during the probation period; or
• death of the employee.

The employer may terminate the employment contract upon serving the termination notice only on the grounds expressly stated in the Labor Code which are as follows:

• if the employer, or its part, is being wound up or is being relocated and the employee does not agree with the change of his/her place of work (so-called “organizational reason”);
• if the employee becomes redundant as a result of a written decision of the employer or respective body on change of the employee’s tasks, technical equipment, a decrease in the number of employees aiming to increase the efficiency of work, or on other organizational changes within the employer (another of the so-called “organizational reasons”);
• if the employee has lost the capability to perform work due to health problems, work-related illness, reached the maximum level of exposure at the workplace;
• if the employee
  • does not meet prerequisites defined in special law as needed for the performance of the agreed job (e.g. loss of a driving license in the case of a driver),
  • was recalled from the position of a managing employee being directly subordinated to the statutory body of the employer, provided that the internal rules of the employer state appointment or election of the managing employee as a prerequisite for holding the office of the managing employee,
  • does not meet, due to no fault of the employer, prerequisites for the performance of the agreed job determined by the employer in its internal rules, or
  • has achieved unsatisfactory job results in spite of the fact that the employer, during the last six months, called upon him/her in writing to eliminate the deficiencies and the employee failed to eliminate them within a reasonable period of time;
• if the employee has seriously violated the working discipline; for ongoing but less serious violations only if he/she was warned in writing on the possibility of such a termination.

The immediate termination of employment by the employer is permitted exclusively if

• the employee was sentenced for an intentional crime and the decision is final, or
• the employee has violated the work discipline in a serious manner. The employer may immediately terminate the employment relationship only within a term of two months from the day of acquainting with the reason for immediate termination, however within one year at the maximum from the day such reason occurred.
• In the probation period, the employer (or employee) may terminate the employment for any reason or without stating it. The termination needs to be done by a written notice which should be delivered generally three days before the termination day, however, if this is not met it does not cause invalidity of the termination. The employer may terminate the employment of a pregnant woman, a mother who has given birth within the last nine months or a breastfeeding woman only in writing, in exceptional cases not relating to her pregnancy or maternal function, giving appropriate reasons in writing, otherwise, the termination shall be invalid.

In case the employer terminated the employment invalidly (as decided by a competent court) and the employee notifies the employer of his/her insisting on the continuation of the employment, such employment shall continue (i.e. the employee shall be reinstated, except where the court exceptionally decides otherwise) and the employee shall be entitled to compensation of lost remuneration. The compensation shall be paid at the amount of the employee’s average salary during the time period since his notification to the employer demanding the continuation of his/her job until the employer allows him/her to perform his/her job or until valid termination of the employment. In case the total period of time for which the employee is entitled to the compensation of remuneration exceeds twelve months, the court (upon request of the employer) may decrease the amount of such compensation or decide that no compensation exceeding 12 months’ claim shall be paid, however, the compensation shall be awarded for a period of no more than 36 months. This limitation shall not apply to a reporter of criminal or other antisocial activity (whistleblower) if the employment ended during the provision of protection under regulation on the protection of whistleblowers.

Both the employer and employee may request the court to declare the invalidity of the termination of the employment relationship only within two months after the employment should have been terminated as a result of invalid termination.

Yes, the protection of whistleblowers and conditions for its provision are set forth in Act No. 54/2019 Coll. on the Protection of Persons Reporting on Anti-Social Activities, effective from March 2019. Protection is to be granted by the special Whistleblower Protection Office in both, criminal and administrative proceedings. Employment of the whistleblower is protected as well. An employer may execute a legal act towards the employee or make a decision regarding an employment relationship concerning a protected whistleblower only with the consent of the Whistleblower Protection Office.

Yes, in general, an employer must not infringe the privacy of the employee in the employee’s workplace by monitoring the employee, recording phone calls made by the employer’s phones or by checking electronic mail sent from a work e-mail address or delivered to such address. Such activity may be conducted by the employer only if the employee is notified about the mechanism in advance and there is a justified reason for such monitoring related to the specific nature of the employer’s activities. If an employer establishes a control mechanism, the scope of control, the manner of performing the control and its duration need to be negotiated with the employee representatives and communicated to the employees.

The discrimination in labor-law relationships on grounds of gender, religion, race, nationality, ethnic group, disability, age, sexual orientation, marital status and family status, color of the skin, language, political or other opinions, national or social origin, property, sex or other status or whistleblowing is explicitly prohibited in Act No. 365/2004 Coll. on Equal Treatment in Certain Areas and Protection Against Discrimination and on Amendment of Certain Acts, as amended.

On top of that, the Labor Code specifically regulates the principle of equal salaries regardless of sex. The respective legal regulation contained in the Slovak Labor Code provides that women and men have the right to an equal salary for “equal work or work of an equal value”.

Work carried out by employees in employment at the same employer:

• that is of the same or comparable complexity, responsibility and that is equally or comparably strenuous (or demanding), and
• that is carried out in equal or comparable work conditions, and
• where the employees reach the same or comparable performance and results, is regarded as the “equal work or work of an equal value."

The employee is entitled to four weeks of paid holiday in a calendar year. The paid holiday of an employee who at the end of the relevant calendar year, will be at least 33 years old and of an employee taking care of a child (regardless of the age) is at least five weeks.

The employer must grant the employee medical leave for the examination or treatment of the employee in a medical facility in the following scope:

• Leave with wage compensation shall be provided for a necessary period of time, at most for seven days in a calendar year, if the examination or treatment could not be performed out of working time;
• Furthermore, leave without wage compensation shall be provided for a necessary period of time, if the examination or treatment cannot be performed out of working time;
• Leave with wage compensation shall be provided for a necessary period of time for preventive medical examination in connection with the pregnancy if the examination or treatment cannot be performed out of working time

In connection with childbirth and care of the newly born child, a woman shall be entitled to leave of 34 weeks. A woman who raises her child herself shall be entitled to maternity leave of 37 weeks and a woman who gives birth to two or more children at the same time shall be entitled to maternity leave of 43 weeks. In connection with the care of the child, a man taking care of a newly born child shall be entitled to paternity leave of 28 weeks, 31 weeks for a lone man and 37 weeks for the man who takes care of two or more children.

In order to improve childcare, the employer shall grant the employee at her or his request parental leave lasting until the day when the child reaches three years of age. Where the long-term adverse health condition of the child requires special care, the employer shall grant the employee at her or his request for parental leave until the day when the child reaches six years of age. Such leave shall be granted in the scope requested by the parent, normally, however, at least one month.

An employee may perform other gainful activity being identical to the business activity of the employer concurrently with his/her employment only subject to the prior written consent of the employer. The consent may be recalled; however, the employer is obliged to state a reason for such recalling.

The employer and the employee may agree to the employment contract on non-competition after the termination of the employment for a period not exceeding one year. This restriction may only be agreed upon if the employee can acquire information or knowledge during his/her employment relationship that is not generally available and whose use could do significant harm to the employer.

The employer shall provide an employee with reasonable monetary compensation amounting to at least 50% of the employee’s average monthly earnings for each month of compliance with an obligation of non-competition. The Labour Code stipulates also other related terms, such as employer’s compensation in case the employee violates his/her obligations and early termination of non-competition obligations.

No, the employees cannot be terminated for refusing to sign a restrictive covenant.

Yes, it does. The pension scheme in Slovakia is built on 3 separate pillars:

• 1st pillar – mandatory pension insurance defined by benefits and funded on an ongoing basis and administered by the Social Insurance Agency
• 2nd pillar – old-age pension saving defined by contributions and capital-funded insurance administered by pension fund management companies
• 3rd pillar - voluntary supplementary pension saving defined by contributions and capital-funded insurance administered by supplementary pension companies

Yes, Social Insurance Agency has been designated to be the competent and liaison institution for the following branches of social security:

• sickness benefit
• maternity and equivalent paternity benefits
• permanent disability benefits
• old-age benefits
• survivors’ benefits
• benefits in respect of accidents at work and occupational diseases
• unemployment benefits
• guarantee benefits for the employee whose employer has become insolvent

No. The retirement age in Slovakia is capped at the age of 64, but this is set for the purpose of entitlement to an old-age pension. The actual retirement age of an employee is determined depending on date of birth, sex and the number of children brought up. Older employees are still allowed to continue to work if they want to.

No, if the person entitled to pension or other benefits decides to continue to work beyond retirement age, he/she is then entitled to both, salary and pension/benefits.

No, the legislation does not allow the employer to make the COVID-19 vaccine mandatory for its employees, and vaccination of employees is voluntary. The employer cannot terminate the employee’s employment solely based on the fact that the employee is not vaccinated unless any other statutory reason for termination of employment by the employer is given.

In the Slovak Republic, the extraordinary situation related to COVID-19 has been lifted, resulting in the cessation of special provisions entitling employees with the right to work through a home office or entitling employer to unilaterally instruct employee to work through the home office. Such a right has ceased ex lege and employees shall therefore return to their original place of work.  The absence of the employee at the workplace may, depending on the circumstances of each individual case, be assessed either as an impediment on the part of the employee (in which case the employee is not entitled to his/her salary) or as a breach of work discipline as a result of which, depending on the assessment of the intensity of the infringement, the employer may terminate employment either immediately or by giving notice while meeting other legal requirements.