Category: Serbia

The National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted a new Law on Consumer Protection (“Law”) on 09 September 2021. The main reason for adopting the amendments to the current law lies in providing a higher level of consumer protection and trying to apply it more actively, in relation to the Law from 2014 and its subsequent amendments from 2016 and 2018. The most prominent novelty concerns direct marketing by telephone, ie the introduction of the “do not call” register. The “do not call” register is a list of landline and mobile telephone numbers of consumers who do not want to receive calls and / or messages as part of the promotion, marketing and / or sale by telephone.

Consumers who do not wish to receive such calls and messages may submit a request to the electronic communications operator in the prescribed form free of charge. It would be the seller’s responsibility to check the register before calling. Such a register already exists in several countries such as France, the USA and the UK, and among the countries in the region, such a register has been established by Croatia.

In order to strengthen consumer organizations, provisions have been prescribed which will primarily keep records of consumer disputes, as there is still no data on how many consumer disputes are conducted before the courts. In addition to the indication that this is a civil case, the courts will also indicate that this is a consumer dispute. In addition to these procedural rules, the obligatory participation of the trader in the procedure of out-of-court settlement is introduced.

However, the question remains, to what extent will such provisions bring results, due to the lack of instruments that will force traders to actually participate in out-of-court procedures. Although this way of resolving disputes has existed until now, traders rejected complaints about goods and services and sent dissatisfied consumers to the court. The provisions concerning the rights of customers during the complaint have been expanded, which has drawn attention to the unfair business practices of traders and expanded the range of obligations they have to fulfil towards customers.

In addition to the existing inspection powers within the Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications, the possibility of imposing fines through misdemeanour orders to economic entities has been introduced, in order to more effectively influence their actions in accordance with the obligations under the Law. Bearing in mind that in recent years there have been more and more contentious situations, this Law has resolved the issue of issuing invoices by manual workers for work performed, as well as the issue of hidden and unplanned costs of agencies to passengers during travel.

From now on, for the provision of services whose value is greater than RSD 5.000, the manual worker is obliged to make an estimation with the specification of services and costs, but also to obtain the consent of consumers before starting to provide services.

The amendments concerning travels and the obligations of agencies have partially harmonized with the Directive on travel in package deals and related travel arrangements no. 2015/2302. In terms of the mentioned Directive, the Law stipulates that passengers will receive before concluding the agreement with agencies all information and all costs that may be incurred, and even the costs of unplanned returns from the travel. The new Law should prevent unfair business practices, and compared to the countries in the region, which have already developed some provisions of the law, it is expected that Serbia will achieve a similar result.

By Jelena Stankovic Lukic, Partner, and Zivko Simijonovic, Associate, JPM Jankovic Popovic Mitic

Vulic Law has advised Italian Serie B football club Lecce in a Falco Case filed against Red Star Belgrade, which was resolved before FIFA’s Football Tribunal.

According to Vulic Law, “the case arose in connection with the transfer of Filippo Falco who signed for Red Star Belgrade (FK Crvena Zvezda) in January 2021 from Italian Serie B team Lecce.”

Vulic Law’s team was led by Partner Milos Vulic.

In general, the Serbian Agricultural Land Act (“ALA“) envisages granting the use of agricultural land, free of charge, to state-owned subjects, or, in instances where particular plots have not been leased for three or more agricultural years, agricultural land may be tendered for to be used by registered agricultural holdings.

However, as an exception ALA prescribes government-regulated use of state-owned agricultural land for non-agricultural purposes. On this note, in July 2021 the Government of the Republic of Serbia adopted a Decree on the conditions, manner and procedure for granting state-owned agricultural land for non-agricultural purposes (“Decree“).

General remarks and conditions

Detailed conditions, the manner and procedure for granting state-owned agricultural land for non-agricultural purposes, as well as the criteria for determining the amount of compensation for such use, are regulated.

The Decree only applies to land which is registered in the real estate cadastre maintained by the Republic Geodetic Authority as agricultural land in ownership of the Republic of Serbia. Cadastral parcels which are subject to restitution may not be subject to use for non-agricultural purposes.

The Land which is subject to the Decree is uncultivated state agricultural land (pastures, reeds and swamps), and/or arable state agricultural land (fields, meadows, gardens, orchards and vineyards) of sixth, seventh and eighth cadastral class.

The land subject to use may not be disposed of by giving the right of use to third parties, whilst the period of granted use cannot be longer than 30 years.

Eligibility

State-owned agricultural land may be granted for use to natural persons or companies in the following instances:

• when energy is produced using renewable energy sources (wind and solar), by building or installing:

1. a wind power plant with accompanying infrastructure and equipment; or

2. a solar power plant with accompanying infrastructure and equipment;

• when performing geological exploration works and/or exploitation of raw minerals (clay, gravel, sand, stone, oil and natural gas, etc.), and/or preforming works on disposal of tailings, ash, slag and other hazardous and harmful substances on agricultural land for a determined period of time with submission of necessary approvals issued by the ministry for mining and geology; and
• when performing activities related to the construction of facilities that have been declared as facilities of importance to the Republic of Serbia, as well as activities that are related to the construction of energy and communal infrastructure, telecommunication and protection against natural disasters, which due to natural and other characteristics, cannot be built elsewhere.

Procedure and Remuneration

The competent authority of the local self-government unit (“LSG“) groups state-owned agricultural land which is planned for use in particular public bidding units.

A decision on the publishing of the public bidding announcement is adopted by the competent authority of the LSG with prior consent of the ministry dealing with agricultural affairs.

Granting of state-owned agricultural land for use is carried out via public bidding in accordance with the application of regulations governing the leasing of state-owned agricultural land.

The starting annual remuneration in the public bidding is:

• five-times the amount of the average lease price per hectare of state agricultural land in the territory of the Republic of Serbia – for use in production of energy from renewable sources and/or performing activities related to the construction of facilities; and
• thirty-times the amount of the average lease price per hectare of state agricultural land in the territory of the Republic of Serbia – for use in performing geological exploration works and/or exploitation of raw minerals and/or preforming works on disposal of tailings, ash, slag and other hazardous and harmful substances.

Such remuneration is paid once a year upfront.

The designated user of the land is obliged to deposit 30 % of the amount intended for the return of the land to its previous state, to the bank account of the ministry responsible for agriculture, before the execution of the use agreement with the ministry. The remaining 70 % must be deposited by the designated user no later than five years before the expiration of the use term.

After the conducted public bidding, the competent body of the LSG, with the prior consent of the competent ministry, adopts a decision on granting state-owned agricultural land for use to the most favourable bidder. Against such decision, an appeal may be lodged within 15 days as of the adoption of the decision.

Finally, on the basis of such decision, and upon payment of a land use fee, the competent ministry and the best ranked bidder will conclude an agreement on the use of state-owned land.

By Aleksandra Petrovic, Attorney at Law, and Andrej Zoric, Associate, Moravcevic Vojnovic and Partners in cooperation with Schoenherr

In the age of digital philosophy, when the electronic management of documents become more and more prominent in both private and public sectors, digitalization of invoices is rather a logical development than an innovative approach in the functioning of the supply chain. Harmonization of e-invoicing regulation in B2G sector has been in effect for seven years in the EU, while Serbia established an e-invoice system in 2019, prescribing mandatory registration of invoices issued in commercial transactions with the public sector on the central registry of invoices (CRF). The most recent novelty in the field happened with adopting the Electronic Invoicing Act and its by-laws when a comprehensive set of rules regulating e-invoicing came into effect.

However, the capability of the private sector to transfer to e-invoicing in B2B transactions remains the main challenge for Serbian legislators as well as their European counterparts. On the one hand, e-invoicing is not related solely to the modernisation of the supply chain but also to providing the tax authorities worldwide with a tool for combating tax evasion. On the other hand, it requires significant adaptation by private businesses.

Centralized system for e-invoicing

E-invoicing is based on the central invoice exchange system, an information system that provides validation and transmitting of invoices. This method of delivering the invoices has already been put to the test in Italy, one of the first countries that introduced mandatory e-invoicing for both B2B and B2G transactions, the so-called Sistema di Intescambio (SdI). The system functions in the following way: once the supplier sends the invoice and the validity of the document has been confirmed, the system delivers the invoice to the certified e-mail or the electronic channel the customer has communicated to its supplier.

Apart from the supplier and the customer, this centralized system may involve intermediaries, i.e., providers of services related to receiving and sending invoices. In Croatia, where the transmitting of the e-invoices is performed by Finansijska agencija (FINA), intermediaries can be registered as providers of the service of receiving an e-invoice, sending an e-invoice or both options. Currently, four providers of the aforementioned services operate in Croatia, two providing the service of receiving e-invoices and two providing the services of sending e-invoices.

In newly adopted Serbian regulation, intermediaries constitute private sector entities performing the activities related to the issuance, sending, receiving and storage of electronic invoices based on the prior approval by the Ministry of Finance. Irrespective of engaging intermediary, supplier/the issuer of e-invoice remains liable for providing the compliance of the invoice with the existing standards.

The importance of digitizing the invoicing for establishing e-VAT reporting system

In France, mandatory e-invoicing was introduced as part of the new tax system introduced by Direction Générale des Finances Publiques (DGFiP). The new system should serve multiple goals – prevention of tax evasion, provision of new economic tool for performing control over taxpayers and real-time data on the economic activity between the private sector. These goals could be achieved due to the comprehensiveness of data in e-invoices, as well as the authenticity of their content, guaranteed by the electronic signature of the issuer. As a result, e-invoices has the potential to become the alternative to bank records as evidence of commercial transactions.

Prior to becoming mandatory in B2B transactions, Italian authorities offered two alternatives to VAT taxpayers – either to send invoice data to Tax Authority quarterly or to start issuing e-invoices in transactions with the private sector. The importance of e-invoicing for Tax Authorities in some countries could be seen through the imposition of an obligation of VAT-registered entities to report all invoices to the Tax Authority even before imposing mandatory e-invoicing in a B2B transaction. VAT registered enterprises are the main private entities subject to mandatory compliance with new Serbian law. Compliance of other categories of taxpayers (income from self-employment and corporate income tax) with the Electronic Invoicing Act is voluntary. 

Challenges and opportunities 

The recently adopted Electronic Invoicing Act has set the following time-frame for complete implementation of e-invoicing:

• mandatory e-invoicing in B2G and G2G transactions from 1.1.2022;
• mandatory e-invoicing in G2B transactions from 1.7.2022;
• mandatory e-invoicing in B2B transactions from 1.1.2023.

Unlike the French approach which included simulation of ChorusPro e-invoicing system for private businesses, there was no pilot test for assessing the preparedness of the Serbian private sector to comply with the new regulation. French pilot project tested the functioning of the centralized e-invoicing platform, as well as adaptability of key players, i.e., the representatives of all industries and categories of enterprises to the system.

Although the mandatory e-invoicing in France was scheduled for a period from 1.1. 2023 to 1.1.2025, a significant percentage of enterprises expressed doubts regarding their readiness to adapt to the new obligation of e-invoicing. According to the data presented by the company Opinion Way, for 4 out of 10 French enterprises there is uncertainty regarding the compliance with the new regulation until the prescribed deadline. In numbers, that amounts to one million enterprises. Could we expect that the Serbian enterprises will show more capacity in digitalization of their supply chains?

According to some estimations, in the EU there are currently over 5 million companies that issue e-invoices in B2G transactions. Mandatory e-invoicing for public authorities involved in commercial transactions was introduced by Directive 2014/55 aimed at establishing receiving and processing e-invoices according to the European standard. Up to this point, Italy is the only EU member that has completed the transition to e-invoicing in B2B transactions and plans to widen the obligation of e-invoice issuance even to cross-border transactions.

A study of the Digital B2B Observatory of the Politecnico di Milano showed interesting data regarding the business orientation of Italian enterprises. Namely, investing in digitalization is not restricted to those companies operating in R&D sector. Rather, the level of investing in supply chain monitoring tools are only 0,7% lower than investing in blockchain and AI. In this way, the capacity of an enterprise to respond to the challenges of digitalisation becomes the indicator of its competitiveness.

This text is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal advice. Should you require any additional information, feel free to contact us.

By Milos Velimirovic, Partner, and Aleksandra Cvorovic, Trainee, Samardzic, Oreski & Grbovic

When it comes to reporting obligation to the National Bank of Serbia (“NBS”), what first comes to mind is the reporting regulated by the Decision on reporting on foreign credit transactions (Official Gazette of RS no. 56/2013, 4/2015 and 42/2020), which is done through commercial banks of reporting obligors.

However, this does not exhaust the obligations of residents to the NBS with regard to reporting and obligors often overlook such other obligations, e.g. reporting on direct investments. The control of exercising of such other obligations has not been subject to control for a long time (at least not under significant control), but the NBS has recently intensified the control and invited payers to provide reports for all reporting periods omitted in the past. It remains to be seen whether it will also institute misdemeanour procedures for failure to meet this obligation.

Legal basis

Under Article 37 of the Law on Foreign Exchange Operations (Official Gazette of RS no. 62/2006, 31/2011, 119/2012, 139/2014 and 30/2018), the NBS specifies the obligation of residents to report on payment, collection and transfer with regard to payment transactions from Art. 32 and 34 of the law, and based on information from such reports the NBS makes a projection of the Republic’s balance of payments as an analytical basis for determining monetary policy aims and tasks and monitors the achievement of such projection.

In accordance with the indicated authority, the NBS passed the following acts:

• Decision on mandatory reporting on foreign transactions (Official Gazette of RS no. 87/2009 and 40/2015 – other decision) and
• Instructions for implementing the Decision on mandatory reporting on foreign transactions (Official Gazette of RS no. 87/2009 and 40/2015 – other decision) (“Instructions”).

Bases of reporting and types of reports

Residents, as reporting obligors, shall be obliged to report on the following bases:

• Direct investments of non-residents in the country;
• Direct investments of residents abroad;
• Investment (construction) works performed by non-residents in the country;
• Investment (construction) works performed by residents abroad;
• Balance and turnover on the accounts of residents abroad;
• Balance and turnover on correspondent accounts kept for foreign transactions;
• Other activities necessary for creation of the balance of payments.

Accordingly, the Instructions stipulate the following reports:

• Report on foreign direct investments of non-residents in the country (balance and transactions) – Form DI-1;
• Report on foreign direct investments of residents abroad (balance and transactions) – Form DI-2;
• Report on transactions of residents with non-residents on basis of performance of investment (construction) works – Form GRU;
• Report on balance and turnover on residents’ accounts abroad and correspondent accounts – Form RN.

In terms of the Law on Foreign Exchange Operations, direct investments are considered as residents’ investment abroad and non-residents’ investment in the Republic in a legal entity with the aim of being included in the management of such entity’s operations. Investment shall particularly include: incorporation of a legal entity, branch or representative office, purchase of stake or shares in the capital of a legal entity, recapitalisation of a legal entity, and any other form of investment whereby the investor acquires more than a 10% stake in share capital, and/or more than 10% of voting rights, in a period not longer than one year following the first investment into that legal entity in the event of successive investments (for the purpose of reaching the 10% threshold), as well as credits and loans with a maturity of five years or longer provided they have the characteristics of subordinated claims (subordinated credits and loans).

During reporting, one should consider the increase of initial capital, however the Instructions also foresee for reporting on additional payments of the founders whereby the initial capital is not increased.

Deadlines and manner of reporting

The forms can be downloaded in electronic form from the NBS website. For each type of report, the NBS published a user manual for filling-in and submitting (Form DI-1, Form DI-2, Form GRU, Form RN).

Reporting entities are obliged to electronically submit the filled-in forms to the National Bank of Serbia – Department for economic research and statistics – Division for the balance of payment – Group for foreign statistics, quarterly and no later than ten days after the end of the reporting period, to the e-mail: devizna.statistika@nbs.rs.

The user manuals for forms DI-1 and DI-2 indicate that final version of these reports for fourth quarter shall be submitted no later than 31 March of the current year for the preceding year, so that the information would be harmonised with the information from the final statement. It should be noted that the report for the fourth quarter should by all means be submitted in the prescribed deadline i.e. by 10 January of the subsequent year, whereas by 31 March it will be only possible to submit the amendments for harmonisation with the submitted financial statement.

Reporting on foreign exchange operations is a continuous obligation that is periodically executed. This is particularly important when it comes to the reporting obligation on foreign direct investments of non-residents in the country and foreign direct investments of residents abroad, considering that the reporting obligation applies both to transactions exercised in the reporting period and to the status of direct investments, which can be unchanged in the given period. Therefore, these reports are filed even if there were no changes in the particular quarter.

Misdemeanour liability

Omission of reporting obligation in foreign exchange transactions represents a misdemeanour under the Law on Foreign Exchange Operations that may be subject to fine from RSD 100,000.00 to 2,000,000.00 for a legal entity and from RSD 5,000.00 to 150,000.00 for a responsible person in a legal entity, and RSD 10,000.00 to 500,000.00 for an entrepreneur.

It should be noted that the Law on Misdemeanours (Official Gazette of RS no. 65/2013, 13/2016, 98/2016 – decision of the CC, 91/2019 and 91/2019 – other law) prescribes that a court may relieve of fine the perpetrator subject to fine, if after the misdemeanour and prior to learning about the conviction, they eliminate the consequences of the deed or compensate for the damages done by the misdemeanour. In the particular case, this would mean the submission of all omitted reports prior to the receipt of motion for misdemeanour procedure.

This article is to be considered as exclusively informative, with no intention to provide legal advice. If you should need additional information, please contact us directly.

By Ivana Ruzicic, Managing Partner, PR Legal

The Serbian Data Protection Law that was adopted in November 2018 to align Serbia’s data protection laws with the GDPR has now been in force for almost two years (its application commenced nine months after its date of adoption, in August 2019).

Although the past year and a half has been unusually challenging due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has certainly affected the development and enforcement of, among other things, rights related to privacy and personal data protection, certain conclusions regarding the current state of affairs can be made.

First, a number of international companies that are not locally registered have appointed their local data protection representatives (“Local Representatives”) for the territory of Serbia. This is based on the extraterritorial applicability of Serbia’s Data Protection Law, which is substantially the same as the respective rule in the GDPR.

It is explicitly envisaged by the Data Protection Law that its extraterritorial effect exists towards foreign data controllers/processors when, subject to certain exceptions, their processing activities are related to: (1) offering goods or services to a data subject in the territory of Serbia, regardless of whether a payment from the data subject is required; or (2) monitoring that part of the data subject’s behavior that takes place in Serbia. In both cases, foreign entities are obliged to appoint Local Representatives.

For now, based on the information published on the website of the Serbian data protection authority – the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Protection of Personal Data – the affected companies include Yahoo, Viber, Netflix, Spotify, Upwork Inc., Alibaba, and Booking, among others.

Penalties prescribed for non-compliance with the aforementioned obligation are primarily symbolic, amounting only to RSD 100,000 (approximately USD 1,040). The penal policy envisaged by the Data Protection Law, in general, is also very mild, with non-compliance with statutory rules potentially leading to liability for misdemeanors and fines in the amount of up to RSD 2 million (approximately USD 20,600) for a legal entity and up to RSD 150,000 (approximately USD 1,550) for a legal entity’s representative. Additionally, the Serbian Criminal Code prescribes criminal liability for data processing carried out in contravention to the Data Protection Law, but, in practice, this risk is generally of theoretical importance only.

In our opinion, this penal policy is, along with the still-generally-low level of enforcement, one of the main reasons why the level of compliance with the Data Protection Law in Serbia is still generally low. The fact that this law is primarily a copy of the GDPR, along with the possibility of extraterritorial applicability of the GDPR to local entities as well, has raised the level of the law’s implementation compared to the previous data protection law (originating from 2008). However, this is still not enough, and further intensive development should definitely follow.

The Commissioner has a crucial role in the process of this further development – it should continue (or better yet intensify) its work on raising public awareness of personal data protection, monitoring the implementation of the law actively, insisting relentlessly on the enforcement of the statutory rules towards all entities/persons who act contrary to the law, and taking clear and firm positions when it comes to relevant data protection issues which may occur in practice.

It should also be emphasized (as the Commissioner does these days as well) that, regardless of the explicit statutory rule that all Serbian laws containing provisions related to personal data processing should become compliant with the Data Protection Law by the end of 2020, such compliance has not been achieved yet.

Overall compliance should be eagerly pursued in the near future, as only a fully compliant regulatory framework can lead to a fully compliant environment, in which privacy and data processing rights can be duly and effectively protected.

By Goran Radosevic, Partner, and Sanja Spasenovic, Special Advisor, Independent Attorneys at Law in Cooperation with Karanovic & Partners

This Article was originally published in Issue 8.6 of the CEE Legal Matters Magazine. If you would like to receive a hard copy of the magazine, you can subscribe here.

SunjkaLaw has advised Novi Sad-based Pin Computers on the sale of the company to Switzerland’s Also Holding.

According to SunjkaLaw, Pin Computers is an IT provider with operations in Serbia, Montenegro, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Founded in 1995, Pin Computers offers IT equipment, mobile devices, and consumer electronics.

Also Holding is a technology provider for the ICT industry, currently active in 27 countries in Europe. According to the firm, “this acquisition is a part of Also’s growth strategy in the region.”

SunjkaLaw’s team was led by Partner Tomislav Sunjka and included Lawyers Velibor Repaja, Jelena Bajin, and Ivan Strbac.

Editor’s note: After this article was published, CEE Legal Matters learned that Wolf Theiss advised Also Holding. The firm’s team was led by Partner Natasa Lalovic Maric and Senior Associate Aleksandar Ristic.

Previously Yugoslav (JUS), and now Serbian (SRPS) standards for tobacco and tobacco products, dating back from the sixties and eighties of the 20^th century, are no longer mandatory. Starting from 10 July 2021, manufacturers of tobacco and tobacco products, including cigarettes, are not obliged to place products in the market that meet the requirements established by these standards.

The reason for this change is entry into force of the Law on regulation of market of agricultural products (Official Gazette of RS no. 67/2021), whose final provisions prescribe that its entry into force shall repeal the Rulebook on technical and other requirements for tobacco and tobacco products (Official Gazette of RS no. 63/2009) (“the Rulebook”).

The Rulebook used to be enacted as a technical regulation based on the Law on technical requirements for products and conformity assessment (Official Gazette of RS no. 36/2009) (“the Law”), according to which tobacco and tobacco products, in addition to the requirements prescribed by special technical regulations, had to meet the requirements established by the following standards upon placement on the market or in use:

• SRPS E.P1.010 Dry and fermented tobacco in leaves – General requirements;
• SRPS E.P1.010/1 Unfermented and fermented tobacco in leaves – General requirements – amendment;
• SRPS E.P1.021 Fermented tobacco in leaves – Oriental aromatic type of tobacco;
• SRPS E.P1.022 Fermented tobacco in leaves – Oriental-additional type of tobacco;
• SRPS E.P1.024 Fermented tobacco in leaves – Herzegovina type of tobacco;
• SRPS E.P1.026 Fermented tobacco in leaves – Burley type of tobacco;
• SRPS E.P1.027 Fermented tobacco in leaves – Virginia type of tobacco;
• SRPS E.P2.010 Cigarettes – General requirements;
• SRPS E.P2.010/1 Cigarettes – General requirements – amendments;
• SRPS E.P2.015 Cut tobacco.

These standards are still valid, hence their application is possible in the future but exclusively on a voluntary basis in accordance with the Law on Standardisation (Official Gazette of RS no. 36/2009 and 46/2015).

Cessation of obligatory application of standards for tobacco and tobacco products marks a significant turnover in the tobacco industry that relied for decades on their application. Whether tobacco companies will opt to continue the application of these standards or they will offer products complied with other requirements (including those established at the level of multinational groups) remains to be seen.

From a legal and technical aspects, it remains unclear why the end of validity of the Rulebook was prescribed by the Law on the regulation of the market of agricultural products instead by the earlier adopted Law on technical requirements for products and conformity assessment (Official Gazette of RS no. 49/2021), which repealed the Law that the Rulebook was actually adopted upon.

This article is to be considered as exclusively informative, with no intention to provide legal advice. If you should need additional information, please contact us directly.

By Ivana Ruzicic, Managing Partner, PR Legal

Technological progress has a magnificent impact on everyday business life, and one of the things made possible by it is creating the opportunity for employees to perform work outside their business premises. But although technological progress gave employers the means to operate their business through remote work, the rigidity in incorporating this work model in practice was shaken only after the COVID-19 pandemic struck, making the expansion of remote work models a result of practical necessity. The sudden spread of remote work in companies also brought concerns of legal nature, and questions like what are the best ways to regulate contracts, safety measures etc.

The Serbian Labour law stipulates that an employment relationship may be established for the performance of work outside of the employer’s premises. This type of work includes working from home and remote work, which means that remote work and working from home should be anticipated as types of employment relationships that differ from the “classic” employment only in the place of work. 

The Specifics of the Remote Working Contract

An employment relationship established in terms of providing the performance of work outside of the employer’s premises must contain all the elements that a typical Employment Contract contains, as well as additional mandatory provisions which regulate the specifics of remote work and working from home. The previously mentioned specifics are the following:

• Duration of working hours according to work norms;
• The way of supervising the quality and up-to-date work of the employee;
• Means of work in order to perform the tasks that the employer is obliged to enable, install and maintain;
• Use of funds for the work of the Employee and reimbursement of costs for their use;
• Reimbursement of other labour costs and the manner of the determination of those costs;
• Other rights and obligations.

Guidance to Safe and Healthy Work From Home

In order to make life easier for employers and employees to work in the circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, one of the Serbian institutions which is an integral part of the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Affairs has provided Guidance to Safe and Healthy Work from Home document, which can be found on the website of the Ministry. The abovementioned Guidance, among other things, prescribes the following:

• The employer keeps the responsibility for the implementation of the safety and health measures at remote work in the same manner as when the Employees perform their work in the employer’s premises. Since the law prescribes the minimum standards of safety and health measures at work, it is highly recommended that the rights and obligations of the employees are specified in the general act of the employer (Collective Agreement or Rulebook) or in the employment contract;
• Unless the employment contract has been concluded for remote work from the beginning of the employment relationship, in order to regulate the status of the employee, it is necessary for the employer to conclude an annex to the contract, which will include the possibility of work from home or remote work for a certain period of time, in accordance with the decision on the schedule of working hours made by the employer;
• The general act of the employer or employment contract determine: the jobs that are supposed to be performed by the employees, necessary resources for the performing tasks; conducting supervision over the work and quality of work performance; control, safety and health measures;
• In order to make work conditions for the employee safe, it is necessary to: provide the workspace for the employees that work from home (if conditions allow it), appropriate work equipment (computer, monitor, etc.), organize work in a way to harmonize family and business obligations, as well as to make sure that the lack of direct contact with the employer and colleagues does not have a bad influence on work performance. The employer should, in cooperation with the employee, provide him with good working conditions, take care of the work organization, provide equipment (if the employee does not own it) needed to perform work, and to consider the working hours and holidays that he is obliged to secure;
• The employer must determine previously if the work can be performed safely and with high quality from home, i.e. to determine if the employee fulfils all the necessary conditions for safe and healthy work at home;
• The Employer needs to provide his employees regularly with information regarding safety and health at work, while the employee has to protect himself from potential injuries during work, as well as to report to the employer any injury incurred during the performance of work.

Rights and Obligations of the Employees

Having everything previously written above considered, we can conclude that the obligations, for both contracting parties, of remote work and work from home are the following:

Obligations of the employer are:

1. to provide a safe and healthy workplace and work environment;
2. to take care of the health of his Employees;
3. to provide work equipment;
4. to supervise the performed work and to maintain contact with the Employees.

Obligations of the employee are:

1. to implement measures for safe and healthy work, to purposefully use work equipment, as well as to check the workplace before starting with work;
2. to balance between private and work life;
3. to maintain regular and prompt communication with the employer or the responsible person for safety and health at work;
4. to obey the Employers instructions on safety measures at work.

Conclusion 

According to all the facts mentioned above, it is easy to come to a clear conclusion that both employers and employees who work remotely or from home should have the same rights and obligations as when the work is being performed in the Employers premises. However, it is fair to say that the existing provisions do not regulate remote work clearly and precisely enough. The provisions of the guidance of safe work from home and the Law on safety and health at work should definitely be updated with more precise provisions, but when will these deficiencies be corrected remains to be seen. 

This text is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal advice. Should you require any additional information, feel free to contact us.

By Radovan Grbovic, Partner, and Petar Knezevic, Trainee, Samardzic, Oreski & Grbovic

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Water Management of the Republic of Serbia introduced the newest amendments of the Rulebook on Conditions and Procedure for Public Bidding for Lease/Use of State Owned Agricultural Land, which came into force on 24 June 2021.

Partner Ivan Petrovic and Senior Associate Marija Vukcevic, comment on the most notable novelty of the latest amendments of the Rulebook – complete elimination of regular „old-school“ public bidding. From now on, natural and legal persons registered as agricultural holdings, being the subjects entitled to participate in respective public biddings, can participate in public biddings only electronically through the new web application.

Since the participants in public biddings for lease/use of agricultural land are agricultural holdings/subjects and not subjects who come from sectors more focused on digital/electronic environment of doing business, it is left to be seen whether the effects of the latest amendments of the Rulebook are going to be positive or negative for the bidders.

The previous version of the Rulebook prescribed two possible manners for conducting the public bidding for lease/use of state-owned agricultural land –  regular – „old-school“ public bidding that requires physical presence, and e-public bidding that is conducted through web application provided by the Administration for Agricultural Land.

The most notable novelty of the latest amendments of the Rulebook is the complete elimination of regular „old-school“ public bidding. From now on, natural and legal persons registered as agricultural holdings, being the subjects entitled to participate in respective public biddings, can participate in public biddings only electronically through a mentioned web application.

The trend of conducting administrative procedures through electronic means is welcomed and ongoing in Serbia for a while now, and especially since 2018 when the Law on Electronic Administration (“Official Gazette of RS“, no. 27/2018) was introduced. However, the main idea of this law was to provide for yet another possibility in realization of one’s rights before the administrative bodies, which assumes the choice of a subject at hand. It was never prescribed that existing procedures that assume personal „face-to-face“ contact should be completely replaced by e-procedures and subjects deprived of the possibility to take part in these procedures physically – „in person“.

Having this in mind, it stands to question the latest amendments of the Rulebook, especially from the perspective of interested subject – since the participants in public biddings for lease/use of agricultural land are agricultural holdings/subjects and not subjects who come from sectors more focused on digital/electronic environment of doing business – it is left to be seen whether the effects of the latest amendments of the Rulebook are going to be positive or negative for the bidders.

By Ivan Petrovic, Partner and Marija Vukcevic, Senior Associate, JPM Jankovic Popovic Mitic