The government of the Republic of Croatia has taken new measures for job protection and reduction of working hours, adopted on 29 June 2020. Hereinafter an overview of the most important information: 

1. Aids for short-time work

• Employer-target group
  • Employers with 10 and more employees 
• Employee-target group 
  • Employees in full-time employment, regardless of whether they are employed on a definite or indefinite period of time
• Amount of aid
  • Net amount of up to 2.000,00 Kuna per month per employee
  • The aid is granted for the temporary introduction of full-time employment, which is less than the number of hours per month but not less than half the number of hours per month
  • Employees may consume up to 50% of the monthly number of hours under the aid for short-time work 
• Realisation of aid 
  • Application and relevant documentation is submitted via an online application 
  • Employer is obliged to calculate and pay contributions on and from the the aid which is paid out to the employee 
  • After approval of the aid the calculated and paid contributions are refunded from the Croatian Employment Service 
• Restrictions

Employers are obliged to return the aid if prior to its receipt and up to 31 December 2021 payment of dividends or profit shares, allocation of own shares, allocation of purchase rights of options, payment of bonuses, purchase of own shares are carried out.

Aids cannot be obtained for employees that are working remotely 

• Criteria
  • Expected decrease of total number of monthly hours of all full-time employees by at least 10% in the month for which aid is applied for. 
  • Proof of decrease of turn-over/income for the month, for which aid is applied for by at least 20% as compared to the same month in the previous year.

Aid is granted to those employers which employ:

• 10 to 50 employees, if aid is applied for at least 20% of the employees
• 51 and more employees, if aid is applied for at least 10% of the employees 

Employers must not dismiss those employees for which the aid has been consumed for at least 30 days after expiration of the aid. 

2. Aid for job protection – micro-businesses

• Employer-target group
  • Employers with up to 10 employees
• Employee-target group
  • Employees, regardless of whether they are employed on a definite or indefinite period of time
• Amount of aid
  • 2.000 Kuna for July per employee in full-time employment 
• Criterion
  • Decrease of revenue for at least 50% in June 2020 as compared to the previous year
• Application deadline
  • from 7 July to 31 July 2020