Due to the corona crisis, more and more employees are working from home.
But that makes controls more difficult - and thus promotes fraud in short-time work benefits, complain the unions.
Due to the Corona crisis, many employees moved their jobs home.
In order to sustainably reduce the number of infections with SARS-CoV-2, the Federal Government had repeatedly called for home offices in recent months and even introduced a home office obligation for employers in January 2021 *.
But that is exactly what now seems to have serious disadvantages in a completely different place.
According to the German Customs and Finance
Union
(BDZ), home office
increases fraud in short-time allowance.
For example, if
the employer has registered short-time work for its employees, but they continue to work full-time.
“The home office has created a gigantic gray area for the misuse of short-time working allowances, which has never existed before,” complained union leader Dieter Dewes on Thursday (February 4, 2021) to the editorial network Germany (RND).
It is now about much more than “just a few black sheep”, reveals Dewes.
The reason is very simple: If millions of employees work at home,
this makes the work of the authorities
that are supposed to carry out the controls extremely
difficult
.
Also because the auditors work from home themselves, says Dewes.
Also read:
Important facts about further training in short-time work.
What is the short-time allowance for?
The
short-time work allowance
is intended to help avoid layoffs and to keep jobs if a company has too little work due to the corona pandemic.
During short-time work, it replaces the companies with part of the salaries for employees.
Companies must register the need for this with the employment agency.
In the video: Short-time work allowance also on public holidays?
Short-time work increased sharply in the second lockdown
The second corona lockdown has caused short-time working in Germany to rise sharply again, reports the German Press Agency (dpa).
In January, according to figures from the Ifo Institute,
2.6 million employees were on short-time work
, which corresponds to 7.8 percent of all employees subject to social security contributions.
Industry, the hotel trade, gastronomy and retail are particularly affected by short-time working.
Also read:
Corona crisis: Refusing to work, vacation, short-time working allowance - you have these rights.
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