2019 Labor Code: Many Enterprises in Vietnam Must Amend Labor Regulations

2019 Labor Code: Many Enterprises in Vietnam Must Amend Labor Regulations - Illustrative photo

Currently, according to Clause 2, Article 119 of the Labor Code 2012, an enterprise's labor regulations in Vietnam include 5 main contents:

- Working hours, rest periods;

- Order at the workplace;

- Occupational safety and health at the workplace;

- Protection of assets, enterprise secrets, technology secrets, intellectual property of the employer;

- Labor disciplinary violations of employees and forms of labor discipline, material responsibility.

However, from January 1, 2021, when the Labor Code 2019 comes into effect, in addition to these 5 contents, enterprise's labor regulations in Vietnam must also include the following additional contents:

- Prevention and handling of sexual harassment at the workplace; procedures for handling acts of sexual harassment at the workplace;

- Cases where an employee may be temporarily reassigned to a different job than stated in the labor contract;

- The person authorized to handle labor discipline.

Specifically, Clause 2, Article 118 of the Labor Code 2019 stipulates the specific contents that must be included in an enterprise's labor regulations in Vietnam as follows:

Article 118. Labor regulations

2. The contents of labor regulations must not contradict labor laws and related legal provisions. Labor regulations include the following main contents:

a) Working hours, rest periods;

b) Order at the workplace;

c) Occupational safety and health;

d) Prevention and handling of sexual harassment at the workplace; procedures for handling acts of sexual harassment at the workplace;

dd) Protection of assets, enterprise secrets, technology secrets, intellectual property of the employer;

e) Cases where an employee may be temporarily reassigned to a different job than stated in the labor contract;

g) Labor disciplinary violations of employees and forms of labor discipline;

h) Material responsibility;

i) The person authorized to handle labor discipline.

Thus, compared to the present, from January 1, 2021, labor regulations will have additional mandatory contents to better protect the rights of employees. If the current labor regulations of a enterprise do not fully include the above contents, when the Labor Code 2019 officially applies, enterprisees must proceed to amend and supplement accordingly.

Furthermore, concretizing this regulation in the Labor Code 2019, the draft Decree detailing the implementation of several articles of the Labor Code on labor management, labor contracts, salaries, labor discipline, and material responsibility, which is being collected for public comment online and expected to take effect from January 1, 2021, has also detailed these contents as follows:

- Working hours, rest periods: stipulate regular working hours in a day, in a week; work shifts; start and end times of work shifts; overtime work (if any); overtime in special cases; break periods outside of the mid-shift break; shift change breaks; weekly rest days; annual leave, personal leave, unpaid leave.

- Order at the workplace: stipulate the working scope, movement during working hours; culture of behavior, uniform; compliance with assignments, employer's directives.

- Occupational safety and health at the workplace: responsibilities to understand and comply with regulations, rules, processes, measures to ensure labor safety and hygiene, fire prevention and control; use and maintenance of personal protective equipment, equipment ensuring safety and hygiene at the workplace; sanitation, detoxification, disinfection at the workplace.

- Prevention and handling of sexual harassment at the workplace: procedures for handling acts of sexual harassment at the workplace: the employer stipulates measures to prevent and handle sexual harassment in accordance with the Government of Vietnam's policies on female labor and gender equality.

- Protection of assets and enterprise secrets, technology secrets, intellectual property of the employer: regulations on the list of assets, documents, technology secrets, enterprise secrets, intellectual property; responsibilities, measures to be applied to protect assets, secrets; acts infringing upon assets and secrets.

- Cases where an employee may be temporarily reassigned to a different job than stated in the labor contract: specific regulations on cases due to production and enterprise needs which allow temporary reassignment of employees to different jobs than stated in the labor contract according to Clause 1, Article 29 of the Labor Code.

- Labor disciplinary violations of employees and forms of labor discipline: specific regulations on acts of labor discipline violations; forms of labor discipline corresponding to the violating acts.

- Material responsibility: regulations on cases of compensation for damage caused by damage to tools, equipment or acts causing damage to assets; cases of compensation for loss of tools, equipment, assets or over-consumption of materials; levels of compensation corresponding to the level of damage.

- The person authorized to handle labor discipline: the person authorized to conclude labor contracts on behalf of the employer stipulated in Clause 3, Article 18 of the Labor Code or a person specifically stipulated by the employer in the labor regulations.

Nguyen Trinh

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