01.03.2021

CAN I BE HIRED BELOW THE MINIMUM WAGE

Can the basic salary agreed for a full working day be lower than the minimum wage for the country?

It is the lowest hourly, daily or monthly salary that employers can pay by law to their employees, experts from the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy explain.

Its amount is determined administratively by the state, as of January 1, 2021 it is BGN 650, and the minimum hourly wage is BGN 3.92 with a normal working time of 8 hours and a 5-day working week.

The basic salary of the persons working under the above conditions may not be less than the defined amount. These rules apply to a full working month.

According to the Labor Code (LC), the employment contract contains data on the parties and determines the basic and additional remuneration of a permanent nature, as well as the periodicity of their payment.

In Art. 3 of the Ordinance on the structure and organization of wages provides that the gross wage consists of:

1. basic salary, determined in accordance with the current legislation and the applied system of remuneration;
2. additional labor remunerations, determined in the Labor Code, in the ordinance, in another normative act or in a collective labor agreement;
3. other labor remunerations, determined in a normative act or in the individual labor contract and not included in items 1 and 2.

According to Art. 4, para. 3 of the NSAPR, the basic salary is determined on the basis of assessment and grading of jobs and positions and is agreed in the employment contract between the parties to the employment relationship.

It is evident from the above that the negotiation of the basic salary below the amount of the minimum wage, determined by the Council of Ministers, is inadmissible, the experts are categorical.